An Unexpected Ally
by bellethebeast1289
Summary: The last thing Coulson expected on his team was an eleven year old girl. But when super genius-albeit slightly bratty-elementary schooler, Brynn Pembroke, dupes the team into bringing her in, everyone must learn how to deal with the brilliant yet immature shenanigans of a little girl.
1. Chapter 1

Coulson walked into the briefing room.

"Someone's been taking out every spy we've sent into D.C."

"Good morning to you too, sir," muttered Hunter under his breath.

"Shut up Hunter," snapped Bobbi.

"Alright, alright sweetheart."

Coulson glared in Hunter's direction, and then turned back to the screen.

"As I was saying, she's taken out all four agents we've sent into DC, for no apparent reason. Just a random civilian, knocking out highly trained spies. We followed Agent Karl with every security camera and caught this."

A video popped up on the screen and Coulson pressed play. The agent walked casually, as casually someone in a full suit can, around a corner into a dark alley, where a small girl with blonde hair approached him. After a brief conversation, she suddenly kicked his chin, knocking his head back, then she kicked his stomach, jumped on his chest, and knocked him unconscious on a metal trashcan. Then, wiping her hands and patting her hair, she walked away with his S.H.I.E.L.D. badge.

The whole team stared -

"I know," said Coulson, "Thanks to Skye, we cross-referenced her face with several other camera feeds, and found these—she knocked out every other agent, with the same tactic."

"She looks barely ten," said Mack, "How did she learn all that? Is she a spy? Part of the Black Widow Program? Or something like that? IS SHE HYDRA?" He cracked his knuckles and glared menacingly at the paused video.

"No, calm down, Mack. Just a girl in DC. Skye found her ID—Brynn Pembroke, age eleven, 51 inches tall, blonde hair, blue eyes, from Mary Grace Orphanage, attends Lee Point Middle School." He pulled up a picture of a girl staring innocently at the camera, with loose curls framing her face, round cheeks and huge blue eyes.

"Oh no," said Bobbi immediately, "you want us to take her in don't you?"

Coulson just looked at her, head tilted to the side as if to say, "Do you even have to ask?"

"Can't we just report her to Juvie or something? Why do we have to deal with her?" whined Hunter.

"Because she targeted our agents, and no one else. She has a reason for this, and I'm not putting any more of my agents in danger."

"Danger of being attacked by a tiny girl with squishy cheeks. Oh my, that's so terrifying. Wait… it actually is…."

"Yeah, which is why we have to bring her in. At least to find out what her point in doing this is. So, her dance lessons are right after school lets out. She gets back from her ballet lessons at 6:30 to the orphanage through an alleyway behind Grey Hill Street. Wait there until she arrives. Hunter, Bobbi, Skye, you all wait at the alley, and May, you scan the area. Got it?"

The team nodded.

"Good. Dismissed."

* * *

The Bus landed in an open field and Hunter, Bobbi and Skye drove out in one of the SUVs. In about twenty minutes, they reached Grey Hill Avenue, parked, and began walking to the alley.

"You know what would be so embarrassing?" asked Skye.

"I don't know if anything's more embarrassing than three highly trained amazing agents, if I say so myself, going after pre-pubescent girl from her ballet class." Said Hunter.

"Being knocked out by said little girl." Laughed Skye.

They turned the corner and all three jumped about three feet in the air. Sitting casually on a trashcan with a light pink duffel bag was their target. She smiled cheekily up at them and jumped off the trashcan.

"Hi," she said shyly.

"Stay away!" Squeaked Hunter, grabbing his chin.

"How did you know we were coming?" asked Skye, incredulously.

"Because I wanted you to," replied Brynn, "Why else would I attack your agents?"

"Wha-um-okay….. errr, come with us." Said Bobbi awkwardly.

"Happy to comply," said the girl eagerly, and ran up between them, swinging her duffel bag. "So, where are we going?"

* * *

Coulson stared at the girl. Then he stared at his agents. And then back at the girl.

"How did you know we were coming?" he asked finally.

"I targeted your agents so you would come after me and take me." She said sweetly.

"How did you know what time we were coming?"

"Well that's the only reasonable time. Early mornings going to school—too many people around going to work, to school, to sell drugs, y'know. During school, well that's obvious. You can't just barge into a school and grab someone from P.E. After school, on my way to dance, too many kids would be coming home from school, and lots of people would be coming home from work, and they'd see you. So clearly not then. Home from dance, I go through the alley, and it's dinner time. People don't eat their dinner in the alley, so no one would see you, and you would have the perfect chance to grab me."

Coulson stared in astonishment, and then quickly shut his mouth and cleared his throat in a very dignified manner.

"So… why did you want us to get you?"

"Because I don't want to live at the orphanage anymore. It's awful. I decided to get "kidnapped." And since I didn't want to get kidnapped by mobsters or gangsters and the like, I decided on a big "secret organization". Luckily, I watch the news so I know about S.H.I.E.L.D. So, I got help from a friend of mine who's an expert hacker, and he hacked into S.H.I.E.L.D. for me. It took a long time. Then I looked up every person from S.H.I.E.L.D. who was sent into D.C. and followed them around and knocked them out. And now I'm finally free."

The whole team blinked. Then Skye said, "Huh. Makes sense. I hate orphanages too."

The rest of the team seemed to break out of their trance.

"Please don't make me go back," begged Brynn, "I really don't want to. I'll do anything you want- just don't send me back."

"Well," said Coulson, "would you try to get kidnapped again if we sent you back?"

"Yes."

"Okay. Hold on- who's your friend? The one who hacked S.H.I.E.L.D?"

"His name is Gage. He's part of a group called the Flowing Tide, or something like that."

"Rising Tide?"

"Oh, right, that's what it was."

"How did you meet him?"

"He's in the orphanage. He says he goes to a soft ball group after school, but he goes to those meetings. I found out, and he made me keep quiet about it. Not like I was going to tell anyways.. But I used it over him to get him to hack S.H.I.E.L.D for me."

"How long did you plan this whole thing?"

"Four months."

Coulson "huh"ed and leaned against his desk. After thinking for a while, he said, "I need to think. All of you out, except May. Get Pembroke something to eat."

The agents left, and Coulson "huh"ed again.

"Well, what should we do about her?"

"I like her," said May, smirking a little.

"But we can't keep a child around the base."

"A very smart and mature child."

"I know but… It's not safe."

"Even less safe for her to go gallivanting off in the middle of DC trying to get kidnapped again."

"Why are children so difficult?"

"I don't know, Phil. But you saw what she can do. She can take out a 6 foot man with a kick, a jump and a punch."

"And a metal trashcan."

"What I'm saying is, we should keep her. She clearly has a lot of skills, and she planned this whole escape by herself. Eleven years old. We could use her help."

"An eleven year old's help?"

"She did basically trick a bunch of adult agents into helping her escape from an orphanage."

Coulson thought for a long time.

"Fine. We'll keep her. But I'm not reading any bedtime stories."


	2. Chapter 2 Of Fanfictions and Fandoms

Down in the kitchen Simmons was making a sandwich for Brynn while the rest of the team stood around awkwardly.

"So…" said Hunter, tapping his fingers on the counter "When did you learn martial arts?"

"I didn't learn. I just figured out a bit on my own," she said excitedly, "The jumping on their chest part is really fun. You have to aim in such a way that they'll fall and hit their head right on the edge of the trashcan, then if they're not out by then, punch them in between the eyes."

"You're an evil little child, you know that?"

"Hunter!" snapped Bobbi.

"It's the truth!"

"Just shut up."

Simmons set a plate in front of Brynn. "Okay, sweetie. Here you go."

"Thanks, errr….." Brynn paused, not knowing what Simmons's name was.

"Jemma. Jemma Simmons."

"Thanks Jemma."

"So, Brynn, how do you like school?"

"Meh. It's okay." Said Brynn, swallowing her food.

"How do you like science… you know, like, engineering, say?" asked Fitz.

"Oh, come on, really Fitz?" Skye rolled her eyes.

"Engineering's okay. But I'm learning about human cells right now. Boring stuff. "

"Yeah, I know," said Fitz, "Jemma seems to find it so fascinating, though."

"Because it is!" interjected Simmons.

"How?!"

"The human body is the most fascinating thing there is! Much more fascinating than engineering and the like."

"Oh yeah? Ask Coulson. I'm pretty sure he'll say that fixing Lola is much more exciting than poking people around with needles."

"Oh don't bring Coulson into this!"

"And much more fascinating than dead cats in the lab!"

"Oh, the stupid cat, again? Really Leopold?"

"Oh don't "Leopold" me."

Mack sighed. "You'll get used to it," he whispered to Brynn, "It takes time."

"I actually ship them already," she piped up.

"You what?" asked Mack.

"Omg, Mack," said Skye, "Ship? Wish they were in a relation_ship_? You really don't know this stuff?"

"No…"

"You need to read some fanfiction, my dear."

"What the hell is fanfiction?"

"The best thing there is, besides Thor," said Brynn, chewing on a piece of bacon.

"Yes!" said Skye, fist-bumping the air, "Thor-3, Iron Man-2. The child's right, Alphonso. You need fanfiction."

"Don't "Alphonso" me…"

"Come one, everyone knows that Iron Man is better," said Fitz, "All Thor does is throw a hammer around."

"Don't insult my bae," warned Skye, "But, since there are more people on Thor's side, I think we win. Anyways, fanfiction is stories that people write about their fandom, Mack."

"Fandom?"

"My poor boy!" squeaked Simmons, "Even I know what a fandom is! You need education."

"Wha- _I_ need education? Who's the one who finished the cloaking device?" he barked back.

"Oh no you did not just go there," said Fitz, dropping the jar of pesto aioli.

Suddenly everyone was arguing over Iron man, Thor, education and cloaking devices all at once, with Bobbi yelling at everyone to shut up and be mature and Hunter, feeling the urge to join in the argument, teasing Mack for having a girl's name for a last name. Brynn secretly ate Fitz's half made sandwich.

No one noticed Coulson and May standing by the door.

"Captain America is the best!" yelled Coulson over the hubbub. That silenced everyone.

"Uh, sir, we were a—" stuttered Skye.

"I think this discussion is over. Captain America is the best. Anyways, we have decided to keep Brynn on the base with us."

"On a few conditions," said May, "She won't get a gun, she's not allowed in the shooting range, no one tries to spar with her, she's not allowed anywhere near the Vaults, she only has access to one laptop, and she can't leave the base without an adult. And Coulson's not reading any bedtime stories."

Fitz jumped. "Where's my sandwich?"


	3. Chapter 3 Giggling

It was about a month after Brynn moved into the base. Brynn crept through the halls. She giggled madly to herself. She was an amazing ninja. She crept slowly to Coulson's office door and peeked in. Seeing that he wasn't there, she quickly ran over to his desk and messed around with his chair and then dashed out, giggling furiously. He had a meeting with May in his office in an hour. Wouldn't this be embarrassing?

She ran down the halls and straight into Mack.

"Whoa, whoa, Brubbles, what are you up to?"

Brubbles was a nickname given to her by Skye, when Brynn left a bunch of bubbles in the bathroom, because Coulson finally bought her a bubble bath bottle. Hunter was secretly jealous that Coulson never bought _him_ a bubble bath.

"I-ah-I was-err….. I need to pee?"

"You're a terrible liar."

"Fine, fine. I'm pranking Coulson."

"Nothing too serious, right?"

"Nope. Just a harmless, but embarrassing prank."

"What'd you do?"

Brynn started giggling again.

* * *

Brynn and Mack were crouching down by the dinner table, messing with Coulson's chair, giggling madly. Yes, Alphonso Mackenzie, the great hunky mechanic, was giggling. Bobbi walked into the room, and stared at the two.

"Do I even want to know what is going on?"

They both jumped, and Mack hit his head on the table.

"Good lord, Barbara, how long were you standing there?" hissed Mack, rubbing his head furiously.

"Enough to see you messing with Coulson's chair."

"We were just looking for Brynn's earring." He quickly lied.

"But she's wearing both."

"Oh look, so it is there! Yay, we found it!..." he said weakly.

"Cut the crap, Mack, what's going on?"

"You can't tell anyone!" squeaked Brynn.

A few minutes later, Coulson was standing by the kitchen window, scratching his head. Bobbi Morse was….. Giggling?

* * *

Coulson and May walked into the office.

"What do we know so far about Samuel Anderson?" asked May.

"He's a Hydra operative in DC. We need to bring him in. He's been looking for people with powers."

Coulson sat down on his chair, and let out a huge rip. He jumped up quickly, his eyes nearly popping out of his head.

"Phil…" said Melinda cautiously.

"It wasn't me! I swear!"

"I thought I told you to let up on the pinto beans."

"It wasn't me!"

"Really?"

"Yes!"

"So, yes it was you?"

"Yes!- I mean no! No! It wasn't me."

"It's okay Phil. People fart."

"Let's just get back to the case, okay?"

He sat on his desk for the rest of the meeting, shifting uncomfortably, and every now and then the corners of May's mouth would twitch.

Meanwhile, outside of the office, Mack was giggling madly like a little girl.

* * *

Bobbi, Brynn and Mack were gathered by the dinner table. Bobbi was bright red in the face from suppressing her laughter as she messed around with the cushion on Coulson's chair. Brynn was perched on the table and Mack was looking around nervously.

"Hurry up, Bob, someone's coming."

"Okay, okay, I'm done. Now it looks less conspicuous than when you two did it."

The three stepped back to observe their handiwork.

"Perfect. Now when we eat dinner," Said Brynn, smirking evilly.

"This is probably the most middle school prank ever."

"But it's hilarious."

They all started giggling and ran out of the kitchen.

* * *

The team gathered in the kitchen for dinner. Coulson was cooking today.

"Pasta again?" whined Hunter, "we had it like two days ago."

"But pasta's good," said Coulson, "Especially with Alfredo sauce.

"Alfredo sauce makes people fart," said Brynn slyly.

Coulson jumped and dropped the spaghetti. May quickly took a sip of coffee.

"Good to know, Brubbles, good to know." Said Skye, wondering what was up with Coulson's twitchy attitude.

"Anyways, the pasta's ready," he said quickly, "Help yourselves. I'll be there in a minute."

Everyone sat down at the table, and Coulson was the last to be seated. When he sat down, though, an inappropriate sound resounded through the air. Coulson jumped up, scarlet in the face, while May looked astonished and the rest of the team laughed. Bobbi, Brynn and Mack almost fell out of their chairs.

"Wow AC," said Skye, "Alfredo sauce disagreeing with you already?"

"No! It wasn't me!"

"But Coulson, remember earlier today?"

"We don't need to talk about it May!"

"What happened earlier today?" asked Fitz eagerly, between his laughs.

"Nothing! Nothing happened!" yelled Coulson, picking up his chair cushion and ripping it open. Out fell a bright pink whoopee cushion.

"Okay who did this?" he said, waving the cushion in the air. "Skye?"

"What? No! I swear, it wasn't me."

Coulson's eyes rested on Mack, Bobbi and Brynn, who were laughing in a heap on the ground.

"Guys…. This isn't funny."

"It was Brynn's idea!" said Bobbi quickly, wiping her eyes.

"And you helped her?!"

They climbed back into the chairs.

"Mature guys, very mature." Said Coulson, throwing the whoopee cushion at them.

The whole team was giggling now. Even Coulson.


	4. Chapter 4 Of Handsome Norse Gods

Brynn and Skye were sitting at the kitchen table, with Skye's laptop, reading fanfiction about Thor.

"That was really good," said Skye, wiping her eyes after reading a particularly sad one about Thor and Loki.

"I wish we could meet Thor. He's so dreamy," sniffled Brynn, wiping her nose.

"I know right? Jeez, Jane Foster is so lucky."

"Who's lucky?" asked Coulson, coming into the kitchen.

"Jane Foster." Replied Skye.

"Is this about Thor being dreamy again? If it is, then I've got great news for you. Thor's coming to earth. Apparently a Kree escaped from the Asgardian prison yesterday, and Thor's been sent to bring him back."

Loud screams erupted from the kitchen, and Coulson came running out.

"I take it you told them about Thor?" asked May calmly.

* * *

The team was standing in a field, waiting patiently for Thor. At least most of them were waiting patiently. Brynn was constantly asking "When's he coming? When's he coming?" and running around staring at the sky.

Suddenly a blinding flash of light appeared and Thor emerged.

"Son of COUL! It has been too LONG!" he boomed. Skye almost fainted.

"WHO are thy COMPANIONS?"

"Thor, this is Agent May, Agent Mack, Agent Skye, Agent Fitz, Agent Simmons, Agent Morse, Agent Hunter, and Brynn."

Thor wrapped Coulson in a tight hug.

"Ouch, Thor, you're hurting my ribs," he wheezed.

"My APOLOGIES son of Coul. Where is the BASE at which the single-eyed one has APPOINTED you? This KREE must be taken back to the DEPTHS of the ASGARDIAN prison, where he will NEVERMORE escape!"

"You'll need to come onto the plane, and we'll take you there."

"I thank you, son of Coul. WHERE is your FLYING boat?"

* * *

Thor had sent the Kree back to Asgard, and decided to stay a weekend with his "Midgardian comrades."

It was dinner time, and Coulson was cooking.

"Son of Coul, what is THIS? The smell is pleasing to me." he asked, holding up a box of ice cream.

"It's ice cream, Thor. You can have some after dinner."

"This BOX is very COLD. Have you any of the delicious pastries that are filled with FRUIT and covered in SUGAR?"

"Pop tarts? No, sorry."

"A pity. Popping tarts are quite DELIGHTFUL."

Brynn trotted up to Thor. "Hey Thor, I was wondering if you could give me a piggy back ride."

"Brynn…" warned Coulson. But Thor was delighted.

"YOU are a VERY fair young maiden! Pray tell, WHAT is the ride of the PIG'S BACK? I know not what it be."

"It's where I climb on your back and you carry me around."

"I shall be GLAD to TRANSPORT you." He bent down and Brynn clambered onto his back.

"You are VERY SMALL. In Asgard, you would be the SIZE of one who has just outgrown INFANCY. You are very—son of Coul, what is the word Agent Skye used to describe the INFANT RABBITS?"

"Cute, Thor. The rabbits are cute."

"Ah, yes. Midgardian child, you are very CUTE. Are all midgardian younglings so TINY?"

He ran off with Brynn on his back. Coulson sighed. Thor had left Mjolnir on the cutting board.

* * *

Thor came into the training area where Skye was sparring with Lance, with Brynn hanging onto his arm.

"Maiden SKYE! I know NOT why the YOUNGLING clings to my LIMB. I cannot DETACH her."

Brynn giggled as she wrapped her arms even tighter around Thor's large arm, swinging her legs around.

"IS she HURT?"

Skye sighed, secretly wishing that she was Brynn right now. "Brynn, let go of Thor. He'll get tired of carrying you around."

"NAY, maiden Skye, I do not TIRE so QUICKLY," said Thor, slightly offended, "I am concerned that she has HARMED herself and cannot WALK."

"She's not hurt," laughed Skye, "She's just lazy and doesn't want to walk."

"Oh. Please DETACH, oh small one. I must go TALK to Agent MAY."

Brynn whined and dropped down from Thor's arm. She looked up at Thor and pouted.

"NAY, youngling, do NOT WEEP!" said Thor frantically, "I will frolic with you when I am DONE talking to the UN-SMILING one."

Brynn smiled and skipped away. Skye was annoyed that Brynn's puppy dog eyes had worked once again.

* * *

Thor hobbled over to Hunter, who was making himself a cup of coffee, with Brynn wrapped around his leg.

"SPEAR, I find it hard to WALK with the child EMBRACING my LEG." He said, shaking his leg, making Brynn squeak and tighten her hold on the Norse god.

"My name's Lance, not Spear."

"My APOLOGIES! Lance, will you ASSIST me in removing BRYNN from my LEG?"

"Brynn, get off of Thor's leg and I'll steal candy for you from Fitz's collection."

Brynn jumped off of Thor's leg immediately.

"There we go," said Hunter, "now you're free, big guy. Brynn, Laffy Taffy or Jolly Ranchers? Fitz ran out of Tootsie Rolls."

"Both!" giggled Brynn, prancing around the kitchen.

"Many THANKS to you, Javelin!" Thor boomed and walked out of the room.

"It's LANCE!"

* * *

"Agent SKYE!" yelled Thor, "What is THIS?" he asked, pointing to the computer, where a fanfiction page was up. "IT speaks of ME and LOKI!"

"It's fanfiction, Thor. People write stories about you."

"They DO? I say, this is quite unusual. Do they write UNKIND tales of ME and LOKI?" Thor picked up the computer and squinted at it. "They speak of MEAD and a drunken LOKI. What IS this?"

"Someone wrote a story about you and Loki getting drunk and being silly," said Brynn, who was braiding Thor's hair.

"Indeed, this STORY speaks the TRUTH. Seven fortnights ago, Loki drank EXCESSIVELY of Asgardian Ale and was IMMENSELY drunk."

"This seems like an interesting story," said Brynn, sitting down on Thor's knee, "can you tell us?"

"Please?" begged Skye, seating herself on his other knee.

"Nay, my good COMRADES, lest I be under the WRATH of LOKI. Indeed, telling this story would be MUCH to his EMBARASSMENT."

"But Loki's not here," pouted Brynn, "Pleeeeaaaaasssseeee?"

"Do not CRY, child! I will tell you the story. Loki need not know, and Heimdall would not betray me in such a manner to my brother. He does not LIKE Loki. One day, Loki was sitting on the pavilion with a casket of mead. I greatly desired some of the drink, so I sat with him and we drank merrily of the mead. I ceased in my drinking after my fifth, but Loki persisted, and drank on until his tenth jug. I felt immensely happy, but Loki was so drunken that he collapsed from his chair and laughed on the ground. He then proceeded to inform me that he was a "Happy pretty sparkly pony", and that my esteemed father Odin was a "Hairy mole-rat." Indeed, the mead had taken over my good judgement and I laughed along. Then he related to me his adventures with a horse, and how Odin's steed was actually his own child, which he gave birth to while he was in the form of a female stallion. Then he rolled around and called Heimdall was a "Glittering Princess Goblin", and when I cautioned him that Heimdall could see all, he roared "HEIMDALL IS A NOSY SAGGY GEEZER!" and I reproached him, saying "Is that any way to address the Glittering Princess of the Goblins?" and we laughed heartily, and Loki drank his eleventh jug."

Brynn and Skye were laughing so hard that they were just leaning against Thor, with their mouths wide open gasping for air, and their faces an unnatural shade of purple.

Coulson walked in, just in time to hear:

"And THEN Loki offended all my avenging companions and said that the Good Captain was a "Spangled Ballerina in Inappropriately Tight Leggings"! AHAHAHAHAHAHA!"

Brynn shrieked with laughter and Skye fell off of Thor's knee.

"Maiden SKYE!" Thor helped Skye back onto his knee and proceeded to relate to them every insult Loki hurled at the Avengers, and how many times he hiccupped and how red he was in the face.

Coulson stalked away, vowing to avenge the fallen name of his idol. "Spangled Ballerina, my foot!" he growled, "Loki will pay for this!"

"AND THEN DO YOU KNOW WHAT HE CALLED DOCTOR HULK? AHAHAHAHA!"

* * *

May looked into the kitchen and shook her head. The Norse god was holding two girls on his lap, with his hair in a bunch of little braids, roaring with laughter, and all three were eating—was that Fitz's candy? She quickly took out her phone and snapped a picture. This was so going on facebook.

* * *

The team was standing in the field, about to see Thor off. They all looked gloomy, and Mack was holding Brynn, who was weeping uncontrollably.

"NAY, dear youngling," said Thor as gently as he could, patting her head awkwardly, "Do no WEEP and shed tears SO. I shall visit AGAIN and maybe even bring LOKI."

"I think just you will be fine," said Coulson quickly, not quite fond of the possibility of seeing Loki again.

"Very well. I must take my LEAVE. Heimdall calls! Farewell MIDGARDIAN FRIENDS! Send my regards to Captain Rogers! FAREWEELLLLL!" he called as a blinding flash of light appeared, and the next moment he was gone. Brynn let out a distressed wail and Skye began to sniffle.

"Well, look on the bright side!" said Coulson, trying to cheer up the melancholy team, "Now we get to talk to Captain America!"


	5. Chapter 5

Lance loved beer. Everyone knew that Lance and his beers had a special relationship that even Bobbi couldn't fathom. One Saturday afternoon, after being stuck in the lab for two hours with Fitzsimmons rambling about some science garble, he sat in the lounge with a raging headache, nursing a bottle of beer. He took a sip and squinted his eyes shut, rubbing his forehead with the cool bottle. He let out a ragged sigh, leaned his head back and prepared himself for a nap.

"Lance, I'm bored," came a little voice from behind the couch. He jumped, and then groaned. Of course Brynn would be here. He liked the kid just fine, he was actually quite fond of her, but he had one problem. He wasn't allowed to drink beer in a room with just him and her. Coulson's rules. Stupid rules, but then again, he quite deserved it.

* * *

_Lance was lying on the couch drinking a bottle of beer, with Brynn sitting on his stomach. He had just taught her a little bit how to spar (don't tell Coulson! He had whispered slyly), and now they were both exhausted and sweaty. _

_"Lance, is that cream soda?"_

_Lance took a swig from the bottle, and was about to tell her it was a beer, when he got a brilliant idea._

_"Of course it is, darling. Want to try some?" How hilarious would it be to see a drunk eleven year old?_

_"Sure!" Lance sat up and held the cold bottle to Brynn's lips._

_"You can take a nice, big mouthful!" he encouraged. She was just taking a sip when…_

_"LANCEAREYOUFEEDINGHERBEER?" _

_Bobbi, Skye, Simmons and May were standing in the doorframe, aghast, horrified, scared and murderous, respectively, all four of them clearly misinterpreting the empty second bottle on the coffee table. Brynn, in shock, swallowed a mouthful._

_"Blegh! This cream soda is nasty!" She spluttered, wiping her tongue on Lance's shirt. _

_"No, no, no, no, no!" yelled Simmons running forward, snatching Brynn from Hunter's lap. Hunter had dropped his bottle and was frozen in fear. "Now look, Lance! You just intoxicated a CHILD! Now I have to run blood alcohol level tests on her and make sure she won't get drunk! What were you thinking?"_

_"_Were_ you thinking?" screeched May. _

_Everyone began scolding him for being so stupid, yelling at him for corrupting the minds of young children, and hissing some things at him that Brynn unfortunately heard as Simmons hurried her to the lab._

_"Jemma, what does fu—"_

_"No, no, it's a very bad word that you cannot use."_

_She hustled Brynn into the lab and plopped her onto a tall lab chair, and immediately began to fumble around with her needles._

_"What's going on?" asked Fitz._

_Jemma huffed out angrily with "Lance", "beer", "idiot", "blood test", and "clump-nugget" inserted in various places in her jumbled response._

_Fitz stood there for a moment, until he got the gist of what she was saying, and then ran off to the lounge._

_Hunter was cowering on the couch, with the three women glowering over him, and he was squeaking_

_"It was just one sip! It was a joke! Don't tell Coulson! She'll be fine! Just a little sip! Please don't tell Coulson! She won't get drunk! Don't let Coulson know! I'm sorry! Coulson's gonna be so mad!"_

_"You thought it was a joke?! Feeding children beer is not a joke, Lance Hunter!" yelled Skye._

_"I thought it would be funny to get her drunk! I'm sorry! It was a stupid joke!"_

_"You wanted to get her DRUNK?!" Bobbi nearly shrieked. _

_"What the hell is wrong with you?" screamed Skye._

_"I'm sorry, I'm sorry! It was stupid!" _

_"I can't believe you would try to get Brynn drunk! You, Agent Hunter, are in huge trouble!" said May, cracking her knuckles and clenching her fists._

_Bobbi grabbed him by the front of his shirt. "Don't ever let me catch you drinking beer alone with her again! Now, go and tell Coulson what you did!"_

_"But-but- he'll kill me!"_

_"Your fault! I can't believe you gave her that much beer!"_

_"What do you mean "that much"? It was just one sip!"_

_"Then what's that empty bottle doing there?"_

_"That's what I bloody drank!"_

_"A whole bottle and a half? In front of Brynn?! No wonder you gave her some. The beer got to your brain and you didn't think, you big idiot. Now go to Coulson! Why were you drinking beer anyways?"_

_"I was exhausted! Teaching a kid to spar can be pretty—" Hunter paused, realizing what he had just said._

_"You what?" growled Skye, taking a step towards him._

_"I-ah-was…"_

_"Spit. It. Out."_

_"I was teaching her how to spar." He said meekly, cowering even further into the couch._

_Another torrent of words rained down upon his head, and he sat there, silently accepting it all. "Now," said May, taking a deep breath once she had finished berating him for breaking the rules, "You will go to Coulson and explain yourself to him. Now!" Hunter fell off the couch and scrambled away to the director's office._

* * *

_Hunter stood in Coulson's office, looking like a dejected puppy. The whole team minus Brynn and Simmons was standing in a semi-circle around him, glaring daggers. _

_"From now on," said Coulson indignantly, "You are not allowed to drink beer in a room that contains only you and Brynn. You will keep all your beer in your own room, and you will not drink beer at dinner time. I will have Fitz set up a camera that will warn me any time Brynn enters the training area. I got my EYES on YOU!" _

_Coulson stalked out of his office, and the rest of the agents followed him. Hunter was left standing alone in the office like a wilting flower. He sighed._

_"It was really just one sip."_

* * *

_Hunter knocked on Brynn's bunk door. She opened it, smiling happily as if nothing had happened._

_"Look, Brubbles, I'm sorry I gave you beer and sparred with you."_

_"S'okay. Sparring was fun. I wish we could keep doing it. Anyways, the beer was no problem. And the look on their faces was totally worth it." she laughed, and then wrapped her tiny arms around his waist. "You're the bestest and funnest brother in the world."_

_Hunter had to swallow multiple times and will himself not to tear up. He hugged her back. Brynn was currently officially his favoritest person on the base at the moment. _

_"Wanna watch Frozen?" she asked. _

_Hunter sighed. Not again…._

* * *

Hunter smiled at the memory, and twisted his bottle around in his hand.

"Lance? Still there?" asked Brynn, poking his face.

"Wah! Brynn! No, my beer can't be in the same room as you!" He jumped up, "Let me go put this in my room."

He ran out of the lounge and came back a minute later.

"There we go. No beer, and now you're safe." He said, swinging her onto his lap, "So you're bored, eh?"

"Yes," she sighed dramatically, "So bored I'm gonna die!"

"Well, then. You know what's the best cure for boredom? Naps!"

He pulled her down onto the couch and wrapped his arms around her, squishing her against his chest.

"No, Lance, no! I don't wanna take a nap! Naps are so boring!" she whined, feebly trying to hit his chest.

"No, Brubbles. Go to sleep." He ordered.

* * *

Bobbi walked into the lounge and smiled softly to herself. Hunter was lying on the couch, with his arms wrapped around Brynn, who was lying on top of him, drooling slightly into his white shirt. She shifted slightly, and draped an arm across Hunter's shoulder and snored lightly.

Bobbi took out her phone and snapped a picture. She was totally going to use this as blackmail.


	6. Brynn's First Mission

Coulson was sitting in his office, filing papers and making phone calls. Brynn was sitting by his desk playing on his phone. All of the other agents were either sparring, in the shooting range or dealing with dangerous chemicals, so Brynn decided to keep Coulson company.

"Coulson," she said, once Coulson had finished making a phone call.

"Yes, Brynn?"

"Is your favorite type of sandwich the Philly Cheesesteak?'

"No….Why?"

"Because its name is PHILly Cheesesteak! Get it? PHIL!" She doubled over with laughter at the immature joke.

"Hahaha, Brynn, that's very punny," said Coulson sarcastically.

Brynn kept giggling and playing 2048.

"Alrighty," said Coulson, after about an hour, "New mission. Let's go brief the team."

He bent down and took his phone from Brynn.

"No, AC! I was just about to beat my high score on Candy Crush!" she said, frantically clawing after the phone.

"If you keep staring at a little electronic screen you'll go blind. Come on, let's go."

He quickly sent the team a text, telling them to meet him in the briefing room. Then, he took Brynn's hand and led her out of the office.

They walked down the hall towards the briefing room. Well, Coulson was walking. Brynn was skipping after him.

"Do you have to take such big steps?" she panted, running up after him.

"Yes, because I am a very tall man." He replied.

"You are?" asked Brynn, looking up quizzically, "I always thought Mack was a very tall man."

"We are both very tall men."

"Oh. I always thought of you to be a kinda short guy. Maybe that's just because Mack is so huge. So yah, I guess you're a tall guy." She shrugged, and Coulson felt happy that finally someone acknowledged that he was, indeed, tall.

They walked into the briefing room, where the team was waiting.

"Hey Guys!" said Brynn, "Did you know that Coulson's a very tall man?"

Coulson smiled. He had a representative for campaign "Coulson is NOT short."

"He is?" asked Skye sarcastically, "Really now!"

"That's very interesting," observed Bobbi, "I always had to look down to talk to him."

"So did I," remarked Hunter.

"Hunter, you're the same height as me!" said Coulson, "Anyways, the Hydra operative, Craig Lorris, we've been tracking down has finally revealed his work place to us. Apparently he's been trying to experiment on young children during their growth spurt, to try to find a way to give a second growth spurt to adults. His ideal height for the adults is over 6 feet 5 inches. It looks like he's trying to make some form of a super army, except not exactly a "super" army—just a bunch of really tall men. Ever since Centipede got destroyed, and their serum lost, they've been trying to find a way to re-build a super army, and Lorris thinks this could be a key to a more stable, but perhaps just as strong, army. He was at Lotus Café 4:36 pm, and walked out at 6:01 pm. That's a little long to be in a café. So, when Skye cross referenced his face with other security feeds, we've been able to find where he goes every day. At 8:00 every day, he walks out of his apartment and at around 8:15, he arrives at this building." Coulson pulled up of picture of a tall grey building. "1067 Parker Avenue, Washington D.C. So, tomorrow at 8:00, we will wait a few buildings before that one at Browerwurst Cafe for him, so that the facility's camera won't be able to catch us taking him. Skye, I want you in the van. Get into Browerwurst Café's security system and turn off the cameras at 8:00. We'll give you a signal when we've got him safely packed away in the SUV, and then turn the camera back on, and cover up your tracks. Got it? Hunter and I will take him in, May and Morse, see if you can find a way into the HYDRA facility that's not too conspicuous. Mack, you and Fitz manually disable the cameras outside of the facilities, so that May and Bobbi can look around with no one seeing them. They have a very strong security system that will take too long for Skye to hack into, so manually disabling the cameras is the only way to do it quickly. Simmons, I want you with Skye in the van, scanning the area for potential threats. Good. We leave tomorrow at 7:00."

"What about me?" asked Brynn, "You are all going this time, and I'll be all alone on the base." She pouted.

"No, Brynn, you can't go on missions with us," said Coulson, "It's too dangerous. There are plenty of agents here. You won't be alone."

"But I want to stay with you!" she whined, "Agent Harris doesn't like me. And the other agents are boring."

"Agent Harris doesn't like you because you knocked him out on a metal trashcan. The other agents aren't boring. I'm sure they'll watch Frozen with you."

"But I want to be with you guys!" she persisted, "Please?"

"No Brynn. It's too dangerous. You will stay on the base and make no trouble, okay?"

"Fine," she huffed.

"Good. Dismissed."

* * *

Coulson sat in his office with May, frowning.

"There will be people monitoring all the cameras around the facility," said May, "They'll see Mack and Fitz walk straight up to the camera and start fiddling around with it."

"Gah, you're right. Maybe we could just have Mack disable the cameras and have Fitz distract the guards monitoring the feeds."

"How? Fitz isn't very good with undercover. At all." She shuddered at the memory of Fitz accidentally giving away to their target that a whole team of twenty agents was surrounding the building, with guns pointed.

"Then Mack could distract them."

"We need both engineers to disable all the cameras as quickly as possible, though. It will take too long with one. Anyways, Mack looks too menacing to be convincing enough undercover. We need someone that HYDRA won't suspect. Someone who looks very…Normal…" She thought for a while and then looked up. "I know just the perfect person to do that."

"No," said Coulson, knowing who she had in mind, "It's too dangerous."

"But Phil, they won't suspect her!"

"But it's too dangerous, for her and all of us."

"She's a very clever child! She played all the spies in D.C. into thinking she was some poor lost child in an alley."

"But it's too dangerous!"'

"They won't attack a little girl."

"But…but…. No!"

"Come on, Coulson."

"What if she gets hurt?"

"We'll give her an ICER to protect herself."

"But she doesn't know how to use one!"

"I can teach her, it's not that hard. ICERs aren't dangerous at all. If she has any trouble, she can just use an alert word, and we'll come."

"Fine. Let's go tell the team. This'd better be a good idea."

A few minutes later, a loud squeal broke through the base, and Brynn ran through the halls, screaming

"I'm going on a mission! I'm going a mission! Look at me, I'm Agent Brynn! Hahaha! Oooh, pretty ICER!"

Coulson sighed and rubbed his forehead. "I sincerely hope this is a good idea."

* * *

Brynn walked cautiously into the large grey building. She put on a crying face and walked over to a desk, where a man was sitting by computers, monitoring the cameras. He turned around when he saw Brynn.

"Sir," she sniffled, "I lost my mommy." She let a few huge tears roll down her cheeks.

"Errr… Where did you lose your…mommy?" he asked, attempting to hide the harshness in his voice.

"I don't know," Brynn sobbed. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Mack in the background of the computer behind the man. "I'm lost, and I'm scared!" she bawled, wiping her nose on her sleeve. She shifted her leg slightly, to make sure her ICER was still there.

"Ummm… where were you going with your mom?"

"We were going to school, but I got lost in the crowd, and now I'm lost!" she wailed.

The HYDRA operative looked highly uncomfortable.

* * *

Coulson and Hunter stood under the shade of Browerwurst's Café, squinting at the sun.

"No alert word yet," said Coulson, "I hope she's doing fine."

"She'll be alert word okay,"' reassured Hunter, "She's done this sort of stuff before. Oh look, there's our man."

Coulson and Hunter casually approached Lorris.

"Craig Lorris?" asked Coulson, "You're coming with us." He stealthily injected the man with a needle, and the HYDRA agent promptly fell to the ground.

"Help!" yelled Lance over-dramatically, "Oh no! This man has just passed out! Let us quickly put him into our car and get him to a hospital."

They clumsily carried Craig Lorris into their car and drove away.

"You're a terrible actor, Hunter." Said Coulson, panting. "Next time, let me do the talking."

* * *

Brynn wiped her nose and took the map from the guard.

"Where am I on here?" she asked, sniffling. She saw the camera feeds go dark behind the man.

"We're on Parker Avenue. To get to Lee Point Middle School, you need to turn a left onto Henry Road, and then walk until you come to the stop sign. And then—what's that big lump in your jacket pocket?"

Brynn jumped. "It's just a…. toy!" she quickly lied. The evil HYDRA man looked suspicious.

"You keep toys in your pocket?" He began to reach for the pocket that her ICER was in.

"Why are you so mean?" Bawled Brynn, backing away. A few more HYDRA agents came into the room.

"I WANT MY MOMMY!" she screeched

Outside the building, in the van, Skye and Simmons jumped and hit their heads on the roof of the van.

"Alert word! Alert word!" screamed Skye, throwing her computer to the back seat and fumbling with the door handle. "Darn it! It locked on itself!"

"I got it!" Yelled Simons, barreling herself out of the open window of the van. She landed unceremoniously on the ground. "I'm coming Brynn!" she screamed and ran off into the building.

She burst the doors open, and saw Brynn surrounded by HYDRA agents who were glaring at her, some reaching into their pockets for their guns. Brynn was shaking, terrified.

"MY DAUGHTER!" Simmons shrieked, "MOMMY WAS SO WORRIED!" She charged through the HYDRA agents.

"Why are you all glaring at my sweet, innocent little girl?" she shouted, "Back away you-you-YOU PEDOPHILES!"

"Pedophiles, really Simmons?" said Skye exasperatedly into the comms, "Just take Brynn and go!"

"My poor baby," Simmons cooed, stroking Brynn's head, "Did the bad men hurt you?"

Brynn sobbed and shook her head, wrapping her arms tightly around Simmons, who glared daggers at the HYDRA operatives, who all looked extremely uncomfortable. "I want to go home!" she wailed.

"Of course sweetie," she said to Brynn. Turning around the HYDRA agents, she growled, "I should call the police."

She hurried Brynn from the building and they got into the van.

"Ohmygosh, Brynn!" Skye breathed out, "Are you hurt? Are you okay?"

Brynn panted and nodded, "They saw the ICER in my pocket and got suspicious."

Someone knocked on the window. It was one of the HDYRA agents. Skye rolled down the window, nervousness boiling in the bottom of her stomach.

"Uh, ma'am," he said awkwardly, addressing Simmons, "I'm-uh- sorry for scaring your kid." He chewed on his lip nervously.

"You better be!" snapped Simmons, "Now leave, you're scaring her even more! Or I'll call the police!"

The HYDRA agent hurried away.

"Dang, Simmons," said Skye, "Impressive."

* * *

Coulson sighed in relief as he clanged the vault door shut. His heart had nearly stopped beating when he heard the alert word. He had to be pretty proud of Brynn, though, she sounded very convincing. He walked to the kitchen, where the team was gathered.

"You have no idea how scared I was when I saw him tapping on the window," said Simmons.

"I was terrified when I heard the alert word!" gasped Skye, "I even threw my laptop."

"Fitz fell off of the ledge on the building," said Mack, "Luckily I caught him."

"We don't need to talk about that, Mack," said Fitz, embarrassed, "Anyways, I'm going to find a way to make the ICERS smaller, so that they won't be as conspicuous."

"Well, Brynn," said Coulson coming into the kitchen, "How did you like your first mission?"

"I wanna do it again!" she cheered.

Coulson stuttered and somehow couldn't find a way to refuse her.

So it was decided. Brynn was going to start training, and Skye was going to be her S.O. The first thing Skye did was present her rookie with a tiny pair of combat boots and a little bullet-proof vest.

"So adorbs!" squeaked Skye, when Brynn put them on. She and Bobbi spent the rest of the day teaching Brynn about going undercover, and pestering Coulson to let her have an "adorable little set of knives!", and bugging Mack to make her a little bunching bag of her own.

Coulson smiled to himself as he watched Skye teaching Brynn how to punch the miniature punching bag, which had "EVIL HYDRA MAN" painted on it.

May stood beside him. "She's pretty excited about becoming an agent."

"I told her it would take a long time, since she's still only a kid" said Coulson, "She's so excited it makes me worried. She's only allowed to go on missions that I deem safe enough, she always has to wear a tracker, she can only have an ICER, and, unless undercover, she will be with one of us at all times. Maybe I'll even put a leash on her."

In the training room, Brynn was punching the bag, yelling "Take that, HYDRA!"

Coulson snapped a picture with his phone.

"I'm going to put this on the S.H.I.E.L.D. scrapbook." He said, walking away.

"We have a S.H.I.E.L.D. _scrapbook_?"


	7. Chapter 7 Movie night

"Movie night!" announced Coulson, skipping into the kitchen.

The team cheered, but then they began to bicker over what movie watch.

"We should watch Friday the 13th!" said Mack.

"No, we should watch all the Lord of the Rings!" argued Hunter.

"Lance that will take way too long!" replied Bobbi, "I say we watch Mean Girls again."

"We've watched that, like, twenty times," whined Skye, "I say we watch The Titanic. Then we can make fun of Jack and Rose again."

"No!" said Simmons, "That movie always makes me cry! Let's watch Despicable Me 2!"

"Karate Kid!" declared May.

"Paranormal Activity!" screamed Fitz.

"Frozen!" yelled Brynn.

"NO!" everyone else yelled back.

"Star Wars!" demanded Mack.

"Star TREK!"

"The Notebook!"

"Pride and Prejudice!"

"CINDERELLA!"

"Easy A!"

"Dear John!"

"PRINCESS DIARIES!"

Everyone turned around and stared at Hunter.

"What? I thought was a good movie."

Everyone stared for a bit, and then resumed yelling at each other.

Soon the debate died down to four movies.

"Star trek!" Chanted May, Simmons and Bobbi.

"Star WARS!" yelled Hunter and Mack.

"Cinderella!" protested Skye, Coulson (yes, Coulson really wanted to see Cinderella), and Brynn.

"Paranormal Activity!" screamed Fitz alone.

This went on for about five more minutes. Finally Coulson yelled

"ENOUGH!"

Everyone shut up.

"There we go," said Coulson, "Much better. Now, whose birthday is closest to today?"

"Fitz's." grumbled Simmons.

"Good, then Leo gets to pick the movie."

"Yes!" cheered Fitz, "Paranormal Activity it is!"

Skye paled.

* * *

The team huddled in front of the TV with a copious amount of popcorn and twizzlers. Fitz was not fazed by the movie at all (or so he thought). He looked over at Coulson and May, who were sitting a little closer together than usual, chewing twizzlers at an alarming speed. He then glanced over at Mack and Hunter, who were squished together on an armchair. Mack sitting perfectly still, tensed all over, and Hunter clinging to the mechanic's arm, gnawing on popcorn. Fitz then looked at the huddle of girls and grinned. Simmons was sitting in the middle, with Skye on her left and Bobbi, who was holding a curled up Brynn, on her right. Skye had swung her legs over Jemma's and Jemma had her leg over Bobbi's curled up one, and all were wrapped tight with a blanket, and all four had their arms in a tangle knotted around each other. Fitz got a brilliant idea. Picking up a piece of popcorn, he chucked it into the midst of arms, blankets and hair.

"Spider!" he yelled.

Deafening shrieks erupted from the blanket, and limbs flailed everywhere, knocking over a bucket of popcorn and three bottles of Coke. Hunter screamed and jumped onto Mack's lap, Mack screamed and threw Hunter's popcorn at the TV, May screamed and kept chewing her twizzler, and Coulson screamed loudest (and longest) of all, and threw a lamp across the room. Fitz laughed and laughed and laughed and then choked on popcorn, and kept laughing.

"Fitz!" screamed Simmons, "You horrible, dirty, evil, treacherous—YOU NEARLY SCARED ME TO DEATH!"

"Never do that again!" screeched Bobbi.

"WHERE'S THE SPIDER?" shrieked Brynn, shaking and kicking the blanket chaotically.

"It was just a piece of popcorn," said Fitz laughing, pausing the movie, "You should've seen you all's faces! Mack was like, "Oh my gosh!" and then-hahahahaha- Hunter was all like, "Aaaaah!" and then Simmons was like "Weebk!' and then-ehehehehehe- Coulson-ehehehe-your face was like-PRICELESS!"

"Never to that again!" warned Coulson, picking up his dropped Captain America teddy bear, "Or I will send you to your room and you can't finish the movie. Now press play."

Fitz resumed the movie, and grinned broadly to himself. Mission accomplished.

When the movie finished, everyone made Fitz clean up the mess that resulted from his prank. He didn't mind, though, the looks on their faces and their screams were worth it. He finished throwing away the destroyed lamp and looked up. Everyone else was gone. And he was alone. All alone.

* * *

Brynn lay as still as a rock in bed, tensed up, eyes darting back and forth between her room door and her closet door. She barely breathed. And she _really_ had to pee. Lots of thoughts crossed through her mind.

_Should I get up? Should I hold it until morning? Maybe I should get up. But then the supernatural force will get me! But I really need to pee. Maybe I could just wet the bed? Huh. That's a possibility. Nope. Eww. That's gross. I should really get up. I'll bring my ICER. But what if it doesn't work? I should still bring it. I'll bring my knife too. _

She debated herself for a few more minutes, and then cautiously reached under her pillow and got her ICER. Then, ICER pointed at the closet door, she slowly rolled out of bed and grabbed her knife. With ICER aimed at the closet and knife pointing towards the dresser, she slowly edged closer and closer to her door. She slowly turned the knob and creaked it open. She peered outside. Seeing nothing there, she crept out, edging against the wall towards the girl's bathroom. She finally reached the door, and her bladder was almost bursting. Slowly she reached for the knob, and the door suddenly swung open, a shadow in the doorway. Brynn screamed and aimed her ICER, and then the shadow screamed and knocked the ICER to the ground, and then Brynn screamed and pointed her knife, and then the shadow screamed and knocked the knife to the ground, and then Brynn screamed again and then the shadow screamed again, and then Brynn screamed for the fourth time and the shadow—

"Brynn?"

THE SHADOW HAD SKYE'S VOICE! No wait… that was Skye.

"Skye!" she screamed, "I really have to pee!"

Skye dragged her into the bathroom.

"Go pee. I'll guard the door. And no more screaming. They might hear you."

Brynn couldn't decide whether Skye meant the team or…..*shudder* Those demons.

She quickly relieved herself and ran over to Skye, who had her gun pointed at the door.

"Did you flush?"

"No!" hissed Brynn, "A demon might come out of the toilet."

"Okay. Good thinking."

Skye slowly pushed the door open and, picking up Brynn, dashed into her bunk.

They slammed the door shut, panting, and then they screamed again, when they saw someone curled up on the bed.

"Hunter!" Skye screamed, "What the hell are you doing here?"

"I'm scared!" he whimpered, "I don't want to sleep by myself."

"And neither did I," said Bobbi, popping up from the other side of the bed. Skye and Brynn screamed and Hunter fell off the bed.

"Bobbi! When did you get here?"

"I was here before you, Lance!"

"How come I didn't see you?"

"Because you were wrapped up in that ridiculous blanket!"

"Everyone shut up!" whispered Skye, "The demons might hear you!"

They all shushed, and climbed into the bed.

"Lance! Get out of the middle!" hissed Bobbi.

"No! I'm scared."

"Brynn and Skye go in the middle! They're younger."

Lance sighed and clambered over to side closest to the door, and huddled close to Skye, who was basically encasing Brynn, and Bobbi had her long arms stretched over Skye. They lay like that, and slowly began to doze off to sleep. They jerked awake to the sound of someone entering their room. Skye slowly pulled out her gun and pointed it at the intruder.

"It's just us!" yelped Simons and Fitz, who were both clutching blankets and pillows.

"What do you guys want?" whispered Skye, putting her gun away.

"We were too scared to sleep by ourselves, but then we were still scared together, so we came to find Skye." Said Fitz.

"Fine." Said Skye, "You can both sleep on the pillows on the floor."

Simmons and Fitz made beds out of the pillows on the ground and lay down, pulling their blankets over them.

Brynn woke up in the middle of the night and saw Mack lying between the two scientists, an arm wrapped protectively around each. She lay back down and put her head on Bobbi's shoulder.

Suddenly her eyes flew open, and she could just make out the door slowly creaking open. She shook Skye and Bobbi, who awoke immediately, and saw the door slowly being pushed open. They shook Lance who leaned down and flicked Mack's head. Mack jumped, waking up FitzSimmons. They all took out their ICERS and pointed them at the door.

Coulson was greeted by seven ICERS all pointed at his head.

"Cripes!" he yelled, "It's just me!"

They all sighed in relief.

"I was too scared to sleep by myself." He explained, spreading out a sleeping bag at Mack's feet and laying down.

The rest of the team nodded and went back to sleep. Just as Brynn thought everything was safe again, the door was thrown open and a very angry person was standing in the doorway. IT WAS THE DEMON! The team screamed and everyone jumped on the bed, squishing Brynn against the headboard.

"I can't believe you all came here and didn't invite me!" hissed a furious May, "I was completely alone at the end of the hall! Do you know how terrified I was?"

The team collapsed in relief. Mack and FitzSimmons rolled back onto their pillows, putting their ICERS by their heads.

"Sorry May," said Coulson, climbing back into his sleeping bag, "I should've woken you up."

May growled and spread out a comforter on a few pillows she had brought and lay down.

"Now everyone go to sleep."

The next day, the base was sprinkled everywhere with salt and sage and Brynn was carrying a rabbit's foot in her pocket.


	8. Chapter 8

Fitz crept through the dark halls of the building with Simmons. They were on a mission in Germany, hunting down an abandoned facility where a few HYDRA scientists were working. Fitz shone his flashlight over a few dusty old fire extinguishers and boxes, quickly moving on, seeing nothing of use. Suddenly Simmons grabbed his arms, and he stopped. There were footsteps approaching. They both tensed and backed up against the wall, just as a HYDRA agent turned the corner. Seeing the two intruders, the agent began to run towards them, pulling a rifle out from behind his back. Fitz and Simmons scrambled for their tiny pistols, backing away and stumbling over boxes. Just as the agent lifted his huge gun to shoot, another gunshot echoed throughout the hall, and the agent fell dead, a bullet hole in his head. Fitz and Simmons jumped, looking behind them where the shot came from. They just made out a dark figure slipping away.

"Who was that?" asked Fitz, breathing heavily, searching through the vest of the HYDRA agent.

"I don't know," replied Simmons, "It's probably Skye or May."

Fitz pulled out an ID. "Hansen Van Beveren." He put the ID in his pocket and they kept moving forward, this time keeping their pistols aimed before them

* * *

Hunter walked quietly through a dark room, pointing his gun in every direction. He looked behind a few shelves, and found nothing. As he backed away from one shelf, his foot hit a box. Bending down, he lifted up the lid. Inside were a few dusty files. Suddenly, he heard a shot fire, and he jumped and turned around, just in time to see a HYDRA agent fall down dead. He looked towards the direction of the shot and saw a tall dark figure slip away.

"Mack?" he hissed, picking up the box and running after the figure. "Mack is that you?"

* * *

Brynn slowly made her way down a rather well lit hallway with Skye. They came to a point where the halls split into two short hallways, both of which turned a corner after a short distance.

"Go down the left" whispered Skye, "and if there's something around the corner, call me. I'll go to the right."

Brynn nodded and crept down the left hallway, ICER pointed ahead. Just about ten feet down the hallway, someone turned the corner, holding a huge rifle. He was tall and had dark brown hair and brown eyes. Brynn recognized that face right away. _Grant Ward._ She opened her mouth to scream, but Ward talked first.

"Don't say a word," he whispered quietly, grabbing her wrist, "Are you lost? Why are you here?"

"I'm not lost," she hissed back, "Let go of me, or I'll shoot you with this ICER!" She tried to twist her wrist to point the ICER at him, but she couldn't loosen Ward's grip.

"You're only a child, you shouldn't be in a place like this!"

"I'm not a child!" she growled indignantly, "I'm an _agent!"_

Ward stepped back, shocked, but still kept a firm hold on Brynn's tiny wrist.

"Let me go!" she yelled, furiously shaking her arm. Skye came dashing over, but halted abruptly at the sight of Brynn's captor.

"Let. Go. Of. Brynn," she said dangerously.

"Skye," said Ward urgently, "You need to get out of here immediately. You don't know what's down here." He let go of Brynn's wrist and began to walk towards Skye.

"I know what I'm doing!" said Skye quietly, but angrily, "What the hell are you doing here?"

"I came here to tell you all that you need to leave. Right. Now! There are over a hundred HYDRA agents here, all armed with machine guns. There are only nine of you. You need to leave, and get out of this place immediately."

"How can I believe you?" whispered Skye, "How do I know this isn't a trick?"

"Just believe me, Skye!" said Ward, exasperated, "I came here to protect you all!"

"Why? Why would you do that?"

Ward paused and fumbled over his words for a minute.

"Because I still care about all of you! Okay? I don't want any of you to die! Now let's go." He grabbed Brynn and Skye by the shoulders and hurried them down the hall. "You want to tell me why you have a nine year old _agent?_"

"I'm eleven!"

"An eleven year old?"

"It's a long story," said Skye, "where are we going?"

"To find the rest of your team." Said Ward, just as Coulson came running through the halls.

"Skye!" he yelled, and then noticed Ward.

"What did you do?" he yelled at Ward, "You told them we were here? You son of a—" He lunged towards Ward.

Ward let go of the girls and backed away. "Sir, listen, I'm not with HYDRA! I found out you were coming here, and so I came to stop you all! You need to get out of here as soon as—"

The rest of the team ran around the corner. Upon seeing Ward standing there, May pulled out her gun and FitzSimmons cowered behind Mack. Hunter stood there in shock and Bobbi whipped out her batons.

"Please, guys," begged Ward, "You need to listen to me! There are a hundred agents down there, and they all know you're here now, and you need to get out of here as soon as possible." He grabbed Brynn and Skye again and began to walk towards the rest of them. Shouts and yells were heard coming from the hallways, and four HYDRA agents turned the corner. One of them yelled something in German, and they all raised their guns. Ward turned around and fired at them with his rifle. They all collapsed to the ground.

"GO!" yelled Ward, picking up Brynn and hurrying the team down the hall, "There's more!"

More agents emerged from the hallways, and ran after them.

Coulson and Ward reached back and fired at them. A few fell down, but more and more kept coming up. Ward hustled them through different hallways. They finally reached a window, which opened out onto the roof of the first story of the building. May jumped through the window, shattering glass everywhere, and Hunter and Mack followed. Skye pushed Fitz and Simmons through and turned back, hesitating, reaching for Brynn.

"Jump!" yelled Ward, throwing Brynn through the window. Mack caught her and Hunter dragged Skye onto the roof.

"Bobbi! Coulson!" shrieked Brynn, trying to claw her way out of Mack's arms. Mack wrapped her arms around his neck and slid down a gutter pipe, after May. Fitz and Simmons both slid down at the same time and Skye followed right after them, almost squishing them on the way down. Hunter came last of all, practically dragging Bobbi down after him by her boot. By this time, May was already only a few yards from the quinjet.

"Start the jet!" Yelled Coulson, coming down the pipe after Ward. May ran up the ramp and into the pilot's seat.

The rest of the team barreled into the quinjet right in time, as the ramp was closing.

"You forgot Ward!" shrieked Brynn, "Let down the ramp! You forgot Ward!"

"Does that really matter right now?" yelled May, frantically pushing buttons, "we need to go!"

"Let down the ramp, he's going to get killed!" screamed Brynn, pounding on the closing ramp door.

Coulson pulled the lever, and the ramp opened. He reached out and pulled Ward in just as the quinjet took off. HYDRA agents fired at the closing ramp.

The team fell to the back of the plane as it jerked forward into the air.

Soon, the flight evened out and the team began to find seats.

"You're bleeding," said Brynn, tugging at Ward's shirt, "You need a band-aid."

"Nah, I'm fine," said Ward wincing, "it's just a small wound." He patted Brynn on the head and sat down, a seat away from Skye.

Brynn still marched over to the first aid kit and pulled out a bandage and some tape. The rest of the team sat awkwardly, still panting, as Brynn began to apply the bandage to the bleeding wound on Ward's arm.

"Hold on," she said, "alcohol and hydrogen peroxide first." She dumped a rather large amount of both on Ward's arm. He winced. Brynn patted away the excess liquid and taped a huge wad of bandage to his arm.

"There we go," she said, "it's not very good, but Simmons can fix you up when we get back to the base."

"I will?" asked Simmons indignantly.

"I thought it was your job to fix hurt people," said Brynn innocently, "Ward's hurt."

"It's okay, kid," said Ward, "It's really not that big of a wound."

"How did you find us, Ward?" asked Coulson.

"I've been following from afar for a while," said Ward, "I managed to snag a S.H.I.E.L.D. tablet, so I was updated on a few of the missions. When I found out that you were coming here, I knew I had to come. That facility is not really abandoned. It's a base to all the HYDRA agents in the western part of Germany."

"How did you know that?"

"I was there before."

After a long (and awkward) silence, Fitz spoke up.

"Why did you save us?" he asked quietly.

"Because it's what I do," said Ward, "I don't want any of you killed, and I do my best to keep my promise."

"You never promised that to any of us," said Fitz.

"No, but I promised myself that. I do care about you."

Brynn seated herself between Skye and Ward.

"Do I really look like I'm nine?"

* * *

Back on the base Simmons finished stitching up Ward's bullet wound in a frosty silence.

"Thanks Simmons," he said, "I'm, ummm, going to the bathroom. Where is it?"

"Down the hall on the left." She said briefly, turning to her computer and sitting down.

Ward awkwardly nodded and walked out of the lab. He bumped into Skye and Brynn in the hall.

"Hey guys!" he said cheerfully. Skye smiled a little, more like grimaced, and nodded.

"Did Jemma stitch you up?" asked Brynn.

"Yup. Good as new now," said Ward, ruffling Brynn's hair, "I gotta go to the bathroom." He smiled and left.

Skye sighed. "I don't know why he would help us. Coulson's not going to let him back on the team."

"Maybe not. But I think Ward is sorry for what he did."

"Think so? Well, May and Coulson are in the office deciding what to do about him. They want us up there with them."

Skye took Brynn's hand and they walked quietly down the hall.

"You did good back there, Brubbles."

"Really? Thanks. Can I upgrade to a real gun now?" Brynn asked, batting her eyelashes.

"Nope." Replied Skye, bopping her on the nose.

They pushed open the door to Coulson's office. Coulson was leaning against his table pinching the bridge of his nose, and May was standing there, with her hands on her hips, as usual.

"Skye, Brynn." Coulson greeted, "Where's Ward?"

"Peeing," replied Brynn.

"…Okay… Well? What do you think Ward's motivations for helping us were?"

"I think he wants back on the team," Said Skye sitting down.

"I think he actually cares about you all," said Brynn, sitting on Skye's lap, "And he can't still be HYDRA. He shot a lot of people back there."

"We can't be sure, though," said May, "maybe this is all an act."

"Maybe, maybe not. But there's only one way to tell." Said Coulson, "the lie detector."

"We have a lie detector?" asked Brynn, "What's it used for?"

"To test everyone who comes into the base. We don't want any double agents here."

"How come I didn't go through it?"

"Because you're a child."

"But what if I'm really a double agent?"

"I'm pretty sure you're not."

"But what if I am?" Brynn pestered.

"Nope."

"But—"

"No more "buts" Brynn. We need to go find Ward."

"If he does pass the test, can we keep him?"

"He's not a pet, Brynn. He can stay on the base, if he wants to. He has some information of value. He is an asset."

"I thought he was a pretty nice guy." Said Brynn, scratching her head.

"What?"

"You said he was ass—"

"Asset, Brynn, not the other one. There's an "et" at the end."

"Oh. Okay."

* * *

Coulson looked over the results of the lie detector test for the fifth time. May sighed and tapped her fingers on the desk.

"Are you going to tell me the results? Or are you just going to keep staring?"

"He's clean," said Coulson, "No lies at all."

May sighed. "So he'll stay on the base?"

"Only if we wants to." Replied Coulson, putting the file in a drawer, "Call the rest of the team and Ward up."

May left the room and Coulson slumped in his chair. He couldn't believe he was doing this. He tried to hate Ward, but after he found out that it was really Ward who was secretly helping them on missions and saving FitzSimmons when the scientist pair was cornered by hostile forces, he found himself unable to really hate the guy. Ward did save their backs back there in Germany, anyways.

May returned with the rest of the team and Ward.

"Well," began Coulson, "Ward, you're cleared. If you want to go, then you can. If you want to stay, you can stay, but not as an agent. If you want to become an agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. again, you'll have to go through training from Level 0."

Brynn clapped her hands and jumped up and down excitedly.

"Does that mean we're keeping him?"

* * *

So Ward ended up deciding to stay on the base. Brynn was ecstatic, and proceeded to give a lengthy and detailed tour of the base. Ward went along with it, smiling the whole time, but Skye could tell that all he wanted at the moment was a nap. Feeling the urge to punish Ward one last time, she let Brynn finish the tour.

Hunter and Bobbi warmed up to him after a few days when he saved them on a mission in France. Skye took a bit longer, but finally after two weeks she finally cracked a joke around him. Granted, it was at his expense, but he took it well. FitzSimmons took a lot of apologizing and saving and shiny new tools, but soon they managed to forgive him, and so did Mack, once he realized his science bros weren't upset anymore. May finally agreed to spar with him, punched him really hard, and then told him he was terrible, which translated into normal people language, means that she forgave him. Coulson was the last one to warm up, but after Ward pointed out a HYDRA double agent in their midst, Coulson let him begin training again. With May as his SO. Ward groaned.

So now they were big happy family made of unicorns and rainbows and sparkles and smiles.


	9. Chapter 9 Sick Kids Don't Drink Coffee

Ward did not know how to take care of kids. At all. So that's why, when the rest of the team was on a mission in Belgium, they suddenly got a call from Ward, frantically telling them to come back and that he didn't know what to do and that Brynn was crying. He sounded positively terrified.

The team captured their targets in less the five minutes, and then raced back to the base, thinking that some disaster had broken out and all their agents were dead.

When they got there though, they were greeted by very calm agents, who went about their business as if nothing had happened. They went into the kitchen, and Ward was sitting at the kitchen table, holding Brynn who was wrapped up in a huge fleece blanket, looking rather pale and green. She had a two thermometers in her mouth, a thermometer sticking out from the left side of the blanket, and three sticking out of the right. She also had an ice pack on her head.

"She's sick, and I don't know what to do," said Ward guiltily. Brynn whimpered and spat out the thermometers in her mouth.

"Seriously Ward? This was it? I thought the place burned down or something." Coulson walked over and plucked all the thermometers from the blanket. "Where did you get all of these thermometers anyways?"

"She was throwing up and her forehead was very hot. I tried to make some chicken broth, but I burned it."

"How do you burn chicken broth?" asked Fitz, rinsing all of the thermometers.

"Apparently it can happen," said Ward glumly, "I needed to make her something warm."

"What did you give her?" asked Simmons, removing the melted ice pack from Brynn's forehead.

"I made her coffee."

"You what?!" Simmons almost fainted. "You don't give a sick child coffee!"

"You don't give children coffee in general, sick or not!" yelled May.

"I didn't know what to do! It's the only thing I can make" pleaded Ward, "She just kept throwing up and coughing!"

Coulson sighed and sat down. "When did this all happen?"

_The night before, Ward was fast asleep in his bunk, dreaming of apple pie that tasted like cheese. Suddenly, the apple pie began to reach up and tap him on the head! He awoke with a start, and Brynn was standing by his bed, poking his face._

_"I don't feel good," she whimpered, climbing onto the bed. _

_Ward let her stay with him for the night. In the morning, her forehead was burning up and she was sniffling. _

_"I need to throw up," she whispered, and tears began to collect in her eyes._

_"Please don't cry!" said Ward frantically, jumping out of bed and putting on a bathrobe. He wrapped Brynn in a blanket and ran into the men's bathroom. Then he ran out of the men's bathroom and ran into the women's. A few female agents gawked at the sight of a man in a pink and white striped bathrobe holding a sobbing child wrapped in a fluffy blanket. They quickly ran out. He dropped her beside the toilet and ran to get a cup of water for her. When he returned, she was sobbing against the stall door. In a frantic hurry, he basically dumped the water down her throat and picked her up again, running back to his bunk. A few agents stared. She fell into an uneasy sleep, and Ward sat beside her and arranged some gummy vitamin pills on the nightstand. She slept for about half an hour, and then they had to rush to the bathroom again. While she slept, he would hold a piece of string over her nose to make sure she was still alive and breathing. This repeated for about three hours, and by the time noon rolled by, Grant was still in his striped bathrobe. Leaving Brynn asleep on his bed, he left to go change in the closet. When he came back, she was awake and trying to sit up._

_"My head hurts," she groaned, "and my stomach and my chest and my arms and my legs and—"_

_Ward handed her a cup of water and the gummy vitamins._

_"I think these are the pills little kids take when they're sick," he said, "You should probably take them."_

_There were about five or six. Brynn chewed them all and drank some water. _

_"I want food."_

_Ward picked her up and wrapped her tightly in a blanket and walked to the kitchen. He plopped her down on a chair and went to the pantry to look for some canned soup. He only found some chicken broth, so he decided to heat that up. When he returned from the pantry, he found Brynn in a tangle of blankets on the ground, crying again._

_"I fell off the chair," she sobbed, "and my head hurts and I can't get up."_

_Ward had to stop himself from laughing at the pitiable sight. When she wouldn't stop crying, though, he started to panic. After putting ice on her head where she fell and hit it, he called Coulson. Meanwhile the chicken broth began to boil…. _

Simmons sighed.

"You gave her gummy vitamins?"

"I thought those were the pills that little kids were supposed to take." Ward looked very lost.

"Those are daily supplements, Ward, and they're only supposed to take one a day, not six. When someone's sick, you give them vitamin C and DayQuil or NyQuil. Not gummies." She sighed again and stirred the pot on the stove.

"I've never had to take care of a sick kid before. She won't die, will she?" Ward twisted his hands around nervously, "I've never seen that much throw up come out of such a small person."

Simmons started to laugh. "No, she just has the flu. She won't die. But the coffee certainly made things quite a bit worse. So did the gummy vitamins." She poured the soup into a bowl and went over to the couch were Brynn was laying.

"Here, sweetie, drink some soup."

"No." said Brynn, turning her head to the inside of the couch.

"But it's good for you. You need to eat," said Simmons, trying to pry Brynn's head around.

"I don't want to eat," whined Brynn feebly, "My head hurts and my stomach hurts."

Simmons was at a loss. She didn't know how to make Brynn eat her soup.

"Skye drank her soup when she was sick. Can't you?"

"No."

Simmons turned around to Coulson. "A little help?" she mouthed at him.

He walked over to the couch. "If you eat soup, Fitz will give you candy," he bribed.

"No he won't!" yelled Simmons, "She cannot have candy right now!"

Brynn shook her head.

"I don't want food."

Coulson turned around to Simmons. "I don't understand. Skye was never this stubborn when she was sick… neither was Fitz or anyone else…"

Simmons shrugged. "Maybe it's because Skye's an adult. Try a different tactic."

Coulson turned back around to Brynn. "Well, what do you want?"

Brynn was silent for a moment. "I want to be cuddled," she whimpered softly.

Coulson's mouth dropped open, and he looked at Simmons who mouthed

"Well cuddle her!"

Coulson shook his head furiously and said "I think Mack would be happy to cuddle you!"

"I _will_?" asked Mack indignantly from the corner where he was standing, "I'm busy. I think Fitz would like to cuddle you."

"Wha-I-I _will_?"

"No one wants to cuddle me!" wailed Brynn, pulling the blankets over her head.

"Look what you've done!" said Lance angrily coming over, "Now you made her upset! I'll cuddle her!"

He sat down and pulled Brynn onto his lap and promptly began to cuddle her.

"No, no I didn't mean that—" began Mack.

"I do want to cuddle—" started Coulson.

"I would be happy to—" stuttered Fitz.

"Too late!" said Lance triumphantly, "the damage is done. I get to cuddle her."

Bobbi and Skye walked into the lounge and saw four men squabbling over who got to cuddle Brynn, with Brynn sleeping happily in a triumphant Hunter's arms.

Bobbi and Skye looked at Simmons, who just shook her head.

"Well after you, it's my turn!" hissed Fitz.

* * *

Coulson carried Brynn into her bedroom and put her down on the bed.

"If you need anything, ring the bell and one of us will come, okay?" he pulled the covers over her and placed a glass of Gatorade beside her bed. He thought she was falling asleep, so he began to sneak out of the room, when she reached out and grabbed his hand.

"Yes, Brynn?"

"Can you tell me a bedtime story? Please?"

"Sure," he replied, climbing onto the bed, "What do you want to hear?"

"Anything."

Coulson thought for a moment, and then began. "There once was a brave little man named Steve…."

May looked cautiously into Brynn's room. Brynn was nodding off to sleep, and Coulson was sitting next to her on the bed, no jacket or shoes and his tie loosed and sleeves rolled up. Then she heard Coulson talking:

"And so Steve Rogers, the once puny man, turned into America's hero, and is the best Avenger. The End."

May smiled to herself and took a picture of the pair. So much for Coulson not reading any bedtime stories.


	10. Chapter 10 Sweet Revenge

It was almost Coulson's birthday. He was turning "28", as he liked to say.

"I'm getting old," he sighed one day at dinner, when his back popped.

"You're not old," said Brynn, stabbing her steak, "Just 'Chronologically Advanced'."

"Very funny Brynn," said Coulson dryly, "you've been spending too much time around Skye and Hunter."

"Spending too much time with me? There's no such thing!" declared Skye.

"It's very much a thing," replied Coulson, scooping broccoli onto Brynn's plate.

"Eww, AC, I don't like broccoli."

"Too bad. You need to eat it so you can grow to be big and strong like me." Said Coulson, popping another cluster onto Brynn's plate.

She huffed and shoveled them down as quickly as she could, swallowing the large lump of food with water.

"Don't shovel your food," reprimanded Bobbi, "Take small bites and don't stab your steak like that, either. Cut it nicely with your knife."

"But Lance stabs _his_ steak," said Brynn, picking up her knife and sawing away at her steak.

"Lance doesn't have manners," said Bobbi, handing Hunter a knife. He smiled mischievously and used the knife to cut his broccoli instead, and continued to stab his steak. Bobbi rolled her eyes.

"It's Labor Day this weekend," said Simmons, "we should do something special."

"I don't like parties," said Coulson, "too much confetti."

"But confetti's the best part!" exclaimed Brynn, "besides the cake, of course."

"Nah. I don't want to mess up the base. Anyways, it's Ward's turn to wash the dishes."

Ward frowned. "Skye, have I ever told you how nice you look—"

"No, Ward."

"It was worth a try," he sighed, gathering the dishes into the sink.

Bobbi cleared the table while Fitz wiped it down. Skye and Simmons swept the floor while Brynn and Mack mopped it, and Coulson and May put away the clean dishes.

"You know," said Ward, grimacing as his thumb touched a chewed up piece of gristle on Fitz's plate, "I don't see why we have robots to clean up alien debris, but we don't have one to wash the dishes."

"You could get killed if you touch alien material. Washing dishes is quite harmless," replied Fitz, tripping over a chair.

"That's easy for you to say, monkey. You're not the one who just touched your chewed up food. Now I have to boil my thumb."

"Sorry robot," said Skye, "Next time you should bring me cupcakes."

"You wish."

Brynn squealed as Mack pushed her around on the mop.

* * *

Brynn sat on her bed, thinking hard. Coulson didn't like parties? What was there not to like? All the sparkles, all the balloons, all the streamers, all the cake, all the bouncy houses… Wait. Coulson was an adult. Adults don't play with bouncy houses. Then what did adults like? Brynn sighed. Grownups were so difficult. Coulson didn't like confetti did he?... Brynn got a brilliant idea.

Brynn marched into the lounge where Skye and Ward were witting on a couch playing Battleship, and Hunter was trying to help Ward win.

"Hunter, go away! Stop cheating!" Skye whacked Hunter's arm as he ran around the couch to look at Skye's board.

"But Ward needs help! He never wins!"

"Wha—Yes I do! Shoo, Lance, I need to succeed on my own. I am a man!"

"You _are?"_

"Shut up Lance! Yes I am!"

Ward stood up and threw Hunter out of the room by his collar and slammed the door shut.

"Oh hey Brynn," said Ward, noticing the little girl, "Wanna help your favorite big brother crush Skye in battleship?"

"SERIOUSLY WARD?" yelled Lance through the door, "I CAN HEAR YOU!"

Ward chuckled and sat down on the couch, pulling Brynn onto his lap.

"If you go over and look at Skye's board for me, I will give you some of Fitz's candy."

"So that's where my secret stash has been going!" said Fitz walking into the room, "You sneaky, bribing, old hags!"

"You're horrible, Ward," said Skye, throwing a battleship peg at him.

"Speaking of candy," Said Brynn pulling her lollipop out of her mouth, "I need some help. Can one of you all take me to go get some stuff from the store?"

"What do you need it for?" asked Fitz, stubbing his toe on the coffee table. "Cripes!" he yelled.

"I need it to do stuff," said Brynn.

"What sort of stuff?" Asked Skye, putting down her battle ship pad.

"Stuff."

"What are you going to do?"

"Stuff."

"Seriously Brynn? I can't take you shopping until you tell me what you're doing."

"But it's a secret!"

"Are you pranking someone?" Said Ward, absentmindedly placing a peg on A-9. "A-9. Skye?"

Skye picked up her pad. "Miss. B-10."

Ward's face fell, and he threw his pad onto the coffee table.

"How did you know?" asked Brynn, pulling a hair on Ward's beard. Ward winced.

"Just a guess," he said, grumpily putting away his pegs.

"You haven't said it yet, Ward," reminded Skye.

"You're so annoying. Fine. You sunk my battleship."

"Yes!" Skye cheered, throwing a piece of popcorn at him, "I win again!"

''This wouldn't have happened if you had just let me help!" Yelled Hunter through the door.

"GO AWAY!" yelled Ward.

"Well are you going to take me?" asked Brynn, "Or will Lance become my favorite brother?" She batted her eyelashes.

"You are very sneaky," said Ward, "Fine. I'll take you, but you have to give me a back massage later and then help me win against Skye."

"But I thought you were a man…"

* * *

Skye was sitting in Brynn's room, waiting for the girl to return from her shopping trip with Ward. Something fishy was going on… The girls had just gone shopping last weekend, why suddenly go again? She didn't really hear Brynn and Ward's conversation, and when she asked them about it, they wouldn't tell. The door opened.

"Cripes! Skye!" yelled Brynn, hiding a bag behind her back.

"Brynn, what did you buy?" asked Skye.

"Nothing."

"Really?"

"Well-I mean… It's nothing important."

"If it's not important, you can tell me."

"It's a secret."

"I'm your S.O. No keeping secrets from me, especially if Ward knows."

Brynn sighed and took the bag out from behind her back.

"Fine. I bought some sparkles, glitter and a set of My Little Ponies."

She set out the boxes on the floor.

"I didn't know you were into My Little Pony," said Skye, picking up the box, "Yeesh, this blue horse is really creepy."

"That's rainbow dash," said Brynn, taking the box and ripping it open, "And I'm not into ponies. I'm pranking Coulson."

"Again? Wasn't that whoopee cushion enough?"

"Nope. His payback was too severe. Seriously, I smelled like chicken bouillons for a week, and purple hair does not suit me."

Skye tossed Rainbow Dash into the air. "So, what are you planning to do?"

"You'll see." Brynn smiled wickedly and ripped open Swirly Pop's box.

* * *

Coulson opened his office, singing Uptown Funk to himself.

"Gotta kiss myself I'm so prett—AAAAAAAAH!" Coulson screamed as he turned the light on. Lined up on his shelf, instead of his prized vintages clocks and watches, were pink, blue and green ponies, grinning demonically at him.

Coulson kept screaming and ran over to the shelf and picked up a pony. He screamed again and threw the pony into the trashcan.

"Who did this?!" he screeched, grabbing all the ponies off the shelf.

May ran into the room and screamed. "Those things! They haunt my nightmares!" (Yes, Melinda May was deadly afraid of My Little Ponies.)

Mack, Fitz, and Simmons ran in and yelped. "Disgusting!" yelled Fitz, tripping on the rug and falling down. "Why does this keep happening to me?!"

Ward ran in and bust out laughing, and Bobbi and Lance followed closely.

Skye and Brynn dashed in, and at the sight of Coulson and May screaming at plastic horses, burst into laughter and rolled around on the floor.

"Brynn?" asked Coulson dangerously, "Did you do this?"

Brynn kept laughing.

"Not funny!" he yelled, "Get these hideous creatures out of my sight!" he said, pelting Brynn and Skye with the ponies. "Where are my watches and clocks?"

Brynn kept laughing, and pointed to the drawers on Coulson's desk. She picked up Rainbow Dash and laughed even harder.

Coulson pulled the drawer open and carefully took out his prized possessions.

"My poor babies," he cooed, placing them on the shelf.

May stared suspiciously at the ponies.

* * *

Coulson picked up his gun in the shooting range. Ward said that he was a better marksman than the director of S.H.I.E.L.D.? Ha! Ward stood beside Coulson and picked up a gun. After an intense staring competition, they both took their places. Coulson didn't notice the slight twitching of Ward's mouth.

"One-two-three-" counted Ward. "GO!"

An explosion of pink confetti shot out of Coulson's gun, clouding the air. Coulson shrieked. Ward fell onto the ground, laughing.

"Brynn?!" Coulson screamed, "Not funny!"

Brynn climbed out of a shelf. "Oh, but it was!" she said laughing.

Coulson screamed again. "How long were you there?"

"Long enough to hear you scream the highest note on the piano," she said, picking up a pinch of confetti and throwing it at Coulson.

"Seriously? What did I do to deserve this?"

"The chicken bouillon in the shower head and the purple die in my shampoo!"

"This is so immature," said Coulson, plucking confetti out of his hair, "You're cleaning all of this up."

Ward laughed and packed up his gun. "Maybe next time, director."

"Wait!" yelled Coulson jubilantly, pointing to the target, "I WIN!" Right on the bull's eye of the target glittered a pink piece of confetti.

* * *

Brynn was very happy. Payback was a success, and her chicken scented hair was avenged. She skipped into her bedroom and turned on the light. On her bed in a perfect line were all the heads of the Little Ponies, and on the floor written in pink confetti were the words "You're Next ~ Coulson."

Brynn slept in Skye's room that night.

* * *

**Ack...I'm so sorry this took so long! I've had a serious case of writer's block. Any ideas would be much appreciated!**


	11. Chapter 11 This is War

**Ack...I'm so so so so sorry. In my defense, I had lots of exams and essays... Anyways, hope you enjoy! **

* * *

Coulson sat in his office, staring intently at a paper clip. So, Brynn had paid him back for his prank on her, but now how was he going to take revenge? Paper clips…Paper clips… Paper clips!

"Uh, sir?" asked Ward, poking his head into the room, "Is everything okay?"

"Yes, of course, why wouldn't anything be okay?" Coulson hurried, jumping up, "Everything is perfectly fine."

Ward looked suspicious. "You suddenly yelled 'paper clips', so I was wondering if you needed them or something…."

"Oh….I yelled that? Okay…. Actually yes! I do need paper clips! Get a big box of them."

He hurried Ward out of the office and laughed evilly. Oh, this was going to be wonderful.

Ward walked down the halls, having just ordered a large box of paper clips from Amazon. What did Coulson need so many paper clips for? And he seemed so fidgety… Aha! Coulson was going to prank someone! Ward stopped cold. What if it was him? Coulson would surely be mad that Ward helped Brynn in her prank, so naturally, he would prank him!

Ward hurried down the hall. What sort of prank could Coulson pull with paper clips? Fill his bed with them? No. He had to prank Coulson before Coulson could prank him. Hahaha, Coulson couldn't beat him! He was always one step ahead of the director, and Coulson could never take him down!

Grinning evilly, he hurried into his bunk and shut the door. He already had a marvelous prank idea.

* * *

Coulson cackled as he ripped the top of the cardboard box open. Inside were over twenty little boxes of silver paper clips. He heard footsteps coming towards the hall, so he shoved the box under the table right as May walked in.

"….Coulson? What's under the table?"

"Nothing!" he squeaked, leaning in an awkward position, attempting to block the box from her sight.

"Coulson…" she warned in her famous May voice that made even Mack tremble more than Hunter did at the sight of a cockroach.

"Fine, fine! It's a box of paper clips."

"Paper clips?"

"Yes. Paper clips."

"Why would you hide paper clips?" she asked, pushing Coulson away from the desk. "And why did you buy so many? Good God!" she dragged out the box. "What is this for?"

"It's for…ermmm….paperwork and…stuff….and things."

"Coulson." She glared.

"Ugh, why are you so good at reading people's facial expressions? Fine. I'm pranking Brynn back."

May rolled her eyes. _What a child,_ she thought, _Paper clip pranks are so last year._

"Ridiculous!" she huffed, "You're turning into a child yourself. Why don't you just act like an adult and let it be?"

"Because…Because…because this is war!" he spluttered.

May rolled her eyes and began to walk towards the door.

"Brynn will know you're planning an attack. You'd better be prepared."

With that, she walked out and slammed the door, muttering something about immature babies. Coulson quickly tacked up a sign that said he was busy, and then settled down to business.

* * *

Bobbi was sitting in the lounge with Brynn, each of them on their own computer, the former watching The Walking Dead, and the latter doing science homework that Fitz and Simmons had assigned her. She was reading about an experiment with dry ice. Apparently, if you used boiling water, than the cloud of fog that came up would be really, really huge….Aha! Coulson said that she was next, so he was going to prank her! Well guess what? She just thought of the best pre-Coulson-payback payback! She was going to prank him again before he could get to her! This was amazing. Amazing!

She jumped up and ran to the lab. Neither Fitz nor Simmons was there, so this was her perfect chance.

* * *

Ward was in the pantry, looking for some flour.

"Ward, what are you doing?" asked Skye, yanking the door open to reveal the tall man crouching by a shelf, looking as if he was caught stealing donuts from the donut jar. Well, he _was_ stealing donuts, but he was mainly looking for flour.

"Wha—uh—nothing!" he exclaimed, jumping up.

"Then why is there powdered sugar on your shirt?"

"Because…Fine. I was eating donuts."

Skye sighed. "You know Coulson keeps count of them, right? Yeesh, move out of the way. I need the coffee mix."

She pushed him out of the pantry and grabbed the container of coffee powder. While Skye was busy making herself coffee, Ward sneakily grabbed a bag of flour and tucked it under his shirt.

"Um, see ya, Skye. Toodles." With that, he dashed from the kitchen.

Skye glared suspiciously at Ward's back. Toodles? Ward never said toodles, unless he was…Aha! He was pranking someone! She went on stirring her coffee, wondering what in the world he was going to do with a bag of flour.

* * *

Ward was pacing back and forth in his room. This was bad. This was very, very bad. Skye was most definitely suspicious. And she would most definitely tell Coulson, because she was just a tattle-tale, suck up, little Daddy's girl! Or in this case, Coulson's girl. Curse you Skye!

Ward realized he had been talking aloud to himself and stopped. How would he deflect Coulson's anger? He would have to prank the director before Skye got to him. But Skye would tell Coulson that it was him! Unless….Yes! It was a brilliant plan! He would out-brilliant everyone on this base!

Ward snuck out of his room and slowly edged towards May's room. A few minutes later he ran out with one of May's many black boots tucked under his shirt.

* * *

Coulson crawled through the air vents with a large ball of a wound up paper clip chain. He quietly hummed the Incredible's theme song to himself as he slithered along the tight metal tube. Finally, he reached his destination. He carefully took off the panel in the roof and slid down a rope. Ew. Brynn had a lot of pink in this bunk.

Trying to burn the image of Hello Kitty out of his mind, he ran to the door and unwound the paper chain. Quickly, with the help of Duct Tape, he stuck the chain in zig-zags across the door. Haha! Now Brynn wouldn't be able to get into her own room! Cackling evilly, he climbed back into the air vent and put the panel back. Oh, this was wonderful.

* * *

Brynn was in Coulson's office, fiddling with a drawer handle. Ha! Coulson would never see this coming. After a few minutes, she stepped back and observed her handiwork. The drawer was rigged, so that when it opened, the dry ice would fall into the pot of boiled water. The water was still piping hot, and, if her calculations were correct, it would stay hot enough for her plan to work for about ten minutes. Now, she just had to get Coulson to go to his room.

She planted the evidence on another team member, and escaped through a window. Oh, Coulson never should have signed her up for science lessons with Fitzsimmons.

* * *

Coulson, elated by how well his prank had gone, skipped into his office. Now, he could settle down and finish paperwork like a mature adult. He plopped down in his chair and opened a drawer.

"Crikey!" he screamed. His whole drawer of paper work was packed down neatly with flour. He noticed a slight dusting of flour on the wood floor. And in the middle of it, was a neat print of the bottom of May's boot. Coulson was so angry he could have hissed. Just kidding. He actually did hiss.

"Agent May! Report to the director's office IMMEDIATELY!" he screeched.

May came running in. "Sir? What's wrong?"

"YOU tell ME what's wrong!" he squeaked furiously, "You're good. Oh, you're good May. All this while, you're telling me to grow up, while you do this?!" he furiously pointed at the crime scene. "You…you…traitor!" he was shaking furiously now, and a vein was popping furiously out on his forehead. Did I mention that he was furious?

"Wha—I didn't do it!" yelled May.

"Then how do you explain that?!" he pointed at the footprint.

"I—i—it wasn't me! I'm serious!"

"Do you really think that's going to clear you? All the evidence points to your boot!"

"But look at the boots I'm wearing right now! They're the exact same boots I was wearing this morning." She lifted up her boot to show Coulson. "The bottom print is different from that in the flour."

Coulson stared intently at the footprint and the boot.

"Oh. You're right. But how do I know you didn't change shoes in the middle of the day, so that you could get away with this prank?"

"Are you serious? I would've planted the evidence on someone else, not myself. What do you take me for? A fool?"

Coulson was about to respond when Brynn came running into the room, emitting unintelligible squeaks.

"Woah, woah, what's going on?" asked May, already beginning to feel the start of a migraine.

"You!" Brynn whirled around to Coulson, "You barricaded my door with PAPER CLIP CHAINS and now I can't get into my own room!"

"Payback!" he crowed, "Payback for your crimes! You can always get into your room by the air vent."

"But you know I'm scared of tight places!"

"And you know I'm scared of Little Ponies!"

Brynn growled in frustration and stormed off.

"Just wait!" she yelled over her shoulder. "I'll pay you back soon enough!"

Coulson huffed. "Anyways, who would've done this, anyways? Ward?"

May thought carefully for a while. "this does seem rather Ward-like, being related to food and all. He's a candidate."

Coulson nodded. "Investigate the matter. It could also be Hunter. But for now, at least my other drawer is untouched. I can work on that paperwork." He pulled open another drawer, and fog exploded from it, enveloping Coulson in a hazy cloud.

"This is—this is unbelievable!" spluttered Coulson, "Two attacks in one day?" He looked down and saw the dry ice in the pot of water, with the words "Gotcha—Ward" written next to it in sparkly pen.

"That's….odd," he muttered, "This says that Ward did it. But if the flour prank was pulled by Ward, why would he admit to one but plant the evidence of the other on someone else?"

"Then he couldn't have done both. Either he's really dumb to admit to one, or he's smart to evade the other. Ward is smart. I don't think he did the dry ice prank."

Coulson's face suddenly screwed up in anger. "_Brynn."_ He hissed. "Brynn pulled the dry ice one. Simmons just taught her about it. This has Brynn written all over it!"

Skye came into the office and stopped short, eyeing the flour.

"What the…Oh. So that's what Ward needed the flour for."

"Ward?" chorused Coulson and May in unison.

"Umm, yeah. He took a bag of flour from the pantry earlier today. I'm guessing that's where it went."

"That little worm!" exclaimed Coulson. "I was right!"

"I can't believe he actually stole my boot," said May dangerously. She gave her famous "May is Very Angry and You Should All Beware" face and stalked out of the room. Coulson was right. This was war.


	12. Much Ado About Something

Something was wrong. Something was terribly wrong. Brynn was pacing back and forth in her bedroom, scratching her head. Bobbi had been unusually….silent during breakfast. Even more than May. Which said a lot. The girl sat down thoughtfully on her bed and replayed breakfast through her mind.

_"Morning Brynn."_

_"Morning Coulson."_

_They sat down at the table with the rest of the team. As they were passing waffles around, Bobbi finally came in and quietly took her seat. _

_"So, Brynn, you have training with me today at the shooting range. I know you're just using an ICER, but you still need to be able to aim it correctly."_

_"Fine. Then can we spar?"_

_"Deal. Now don't use so much syrup!"_

_Bobbi quietly cut her pancakes. _

HOLD ON!

_Bobbi quietly cut her pancakes….something was missing…something was missing….._

Brynn peered closely at the picture in her mind and stared intently at Bobbi's wrist. That's what it was! Bobbi wasn't wearing her bracelet! Bobbi always wore a beaded bracelet that Hunter had made her. But she wasn't wearing it. So…either she lost it… but she always had it on. Even in the shower. So she couldn't have lost it.

Brynn bounced up and down on her bed. She was very quiet at breakfast, and she sat beside May and Mack instead of beside Mack and Hunter….Hunter! She was mad at Hunter!

Brynn's eyes gleamed evilly. So…The two lovebirds had a spat, had they? Time for Mission Brynn Brings Bobbi and Hunter Back Together!

She leapt off her pillows and out of her bunk.

"SKYE!" she yelled, running into the shooting range.

"Good gracious, Brynn!" Skye yelled, quickly putting a rack of rifles onto the top shelf. "You're twenty minutes early."

"I know. But I need some help."

"Oh no. This can't be good."

"But this time it actually is!"

"Really? The last time you needed help was to break into the lab."

Brynn stomped her foot in frustration. "This time it won't require any breaking in. Maybe. But it will be for the greater good!"

Skye deep inside was laughing her head off at Brynn's frustration. She looked hilarious when she was frustrated. Kind of like a flustered chicken that had just been dunked in a bucket of water. "And what is this greater good you speak of?"

"You seriously didn't notice this morning? _At breakfast?_"

"…no…"

"Bobbi? You didn't notice? The _thing?"_

Good lord, could the child just get to the point already? "What thing? She was just rather quiet."

Brynn sighed dramatically. "She wasn't wearing the bracelet Lance gave her! You know what that means?"

"…no…"

Brynn leaned in and whisper-screamed. "They're fighting again!" She sighed dramatically once more and sat down on a box. "And now we'll be subjected to first, the awkward silence, which grows into really awkward silence, which then grows into unbearably awkward silence. And then you know what happens? They'll have a huge screaming match! For hours! And I can't go to sleep, because they're either yelling in Bobbi or Lance's bunk, both of which are close to mine, and yours, and Coulson's, and May's, and Fitz's, and Simmons, and Mack's. The point is, none of us will be able to sleep! And then the awkward silence resumes, but this time with their horrible glares that make all of us even more uncomfortable. And then, they start refusing to be in the same room as each other, and then they start refusing to go on missions with each other, and then Lance goes on a mini vacation and always comes back with a black eye."

"Gee, Brynn. You seriously know all that?"

"Yes! I analyzed how they acted every time they argued, and every single time it is consistent with this pattern. And I'm not done. The worst part is when Bobbi sees Lance with the black eye or bruise under his cheek. They have yet another screaming match and we are unable to sleep yet again. Then, randomly, they're all happy and cuddly with each other again the next day, and if we bring up the fight, they snap at us to mind our own business. It happens every. Single. Time. Do you want to go through it again? Or shall we stop it in its first phase?"

The kid sure knew how to give a speech. "Well…I don't really want to hear those screaming matches again…"

Skye knew that half of the second screaming match was most definitely _not_ in anger…but no need to scar the poor child.

"I guess it is very annoying." Skye agreed.

"And we must stop it at once! Rise up to the occasion!" Brynn jumped off her box. "Come! We have planning to do! To my bunk! We must away!"

She charged out of the shooting range, leaving Skye in stitches behind her.

* * *

Skye flopped down on the couch beside Brynn.

"See? Isn't this a better plan?"

Brynn huffed. "I guess. Simmons wouldn't give me any of those drugs, anyways."

Brynn had advocated sneaking drugs into Bobbi and Lance's coffee to make them giddy and then hypnotize them into being happy and cuddly with each other. It took Skye a while, but she managed to convince Brynn that drugging people was really not that good of an idea, despite how tempting it sounded.

"You called this meeting for what?" asked Hunter, coming into the room with some shaving cream on his chin.

"See?" whispered Brynn into Skye's ear, "I told you he always shaved when he was mad at Bobbi."

Skye cleared her throat. "We have to wait for the rest to come."

Bobbi came in next and made a huge show of sitting far away from Lance.

"So what's this meeting for?"

Brynn jumped up. "To sort out you two's problems. Talk it out and be all happy and cuddly again!"

She and Skye dashed from the room and locked the doors. There was angry muffling and shouting from inside, but the two schemers were already well down the hall.

* * *

"I don't hear them talking," whispered Brynn to Skye.

"Neither do I. Are they asleep?" They pressed their ears to the door again.

"No. They're right behind you."

Brynn and Skye screamed and jumped.

"Bobbi! Lance! How—what—you were—wha?" Brynn spluttered.

"You forget I know how to pick locks," said Bobbi, holding up a bent paper clip. "Never do that again, or I'll tell Coulson."

She glared at Hunter and stalked away. Hunter glared at her back and stalked away in the other direction.

"Oh no," groaned Brynn, "Now we're in the glaring phase."

* * *

"This is even worse," sighed Brynn, "Not only are they still fighting, but now they know we're trying to get them back together! Ugh, our plans are ruined." She threw herself down on the bed and buried her head under a pillow. "Mfhish fshuscksh!" she yelled into the pillow.

"I'm sorry, what?" Skye asked, greatly amused by Brynn's dramatic flares.

"This sucks!" Brynn yelled again, popping up from the pillow. "We have to think of another plan! But we need to be very discreet about it this time."

Skye lay down on the bed beside Brynn. "So…what do you have in mind?"

"Well…drugging them _is_ very discreet—"

"And _very_ illegal."

"But if it wasn't—"

"But it is."

They sat in silence for a while contemplating the cruel nature of life. At least Brynn was. Skye was trying to hold in her amusement at Brynn's despair.

* * *

"SKYE!" screamed Brynn, bursting into Skye's bunk.

"Knock, Brynn!" yelped Skye, "Ever heard of knocking? I might have been changing!"

"But you're not."

"But if I was?"

"What?"

"What?"

"Never mind! Skye, I have a fabulous plan for Mission BBBHBT!"

"Mission what?"

"BBBHBT! Brynn Brings Bobbi and Hunter Back Together! Anyways, Fitz and Simmons made me watch Joss Whedon's Much Ado About Nothing—dude, there was a guy who look a lot like Coulson. I'm serious. They look like twins. But Coulson's better looking. Anyways, the point is…I HAVE A FABULOUS PLAN! Soooooo, we need to be somewhere where Bobbi can hear us, and then talk about how much Hunter loves her and is pining after her and is almost ready even to apologize!"

"Bobbi's not going to believe that. Hunter never apologizes."

"Fine. We leave out the apologizing part. But then, we do the same with Hunter."

"And are you sure this will work?"

"Yes! The love expert knows best."

"….Since when was Shakespeare a love expert?"

"Not Shakespeare, silly. Me!"

Brynn ran squealing out of the bunk, with Skye yelling after her.

"Wait…since when were you a love expert? You haven't ever even had a boyfriend. Wait… _have you?!_ BRYNN! Come back! You're not allowed to have a boyfriend! Brynn!"

* * *

Brynn dashed through the hallways, not watching where she was going. As she turned a corner, she crashed into Coulson.

"Woah, woah, what in the world are you doing, tearing around like this?"

Brynn let out a long string of unintelligible squeaks (she did this whenever she was very angry or excited), and stomped her foot.

Skye came running after Brynn.

"Brynn, no boyfriends!" she panted.

"Boyfriend?!" screamed Coulson, dropping his binder, "BOYFRIEND?!"

Brynn stopped squeaking. "What? I don't have a boyfriend!"

Skye straightened up. "Oh. Really?"

"Yes. Really. Boys are icky."

Coulson looked very offended. "Well, what are you doing?"

Brynn helped Coulson pick up the scattered papers. "We're on a mission to get Hunter and Bobbi to stop fighting."

"Ah, so that's what this is about. Gee, their fighting is getting on your nerves too? Well, you know what? You two don't worry about it. I'll deal with those two."

He walked away, deep in thought, leaving Brynn and Skye holding his binder.

"Uhhh, Coulson?" Brynn called after him, waving the binder. "Do you still need this?"

* * *

Whatever Coulson did seemed to have worked very well, because Bobbi and Hunter were all sickly sweet again the next day, as if nothing had ever happened. Brynn couldn't figure out how Coulson did it, and confirmed her suspicions once more that Coulson had some magical powers. How else could his grilled cheese sandwiches be so good?


	13. Chapter 13 Pranks and Prejudice

Brynn was fretting around the base. Again. But this time it seemed different. She was _really_ worried. Skye couldn't figure out what it was…Bobbi and Hunter were perfectly fine…Coulson made grilled cheese _three_ times that week…and Ward hadn't knocked over her immaculate Lego tower (which was even taller than Mack) even once. (Coulson bought the Legos for Brynn when she was pestering him about being bored one day, but everyone knew that Coulson played with them every now and then. He forgot to close the blinds in his office.)

At the present, Brynn was curled up on the couch, reading a large binder full of science lectures that Simmons had written up in one night. Skye hoped that the overly-excited scientist hadn't included any of those thirteen syllable words she and Fitz threw at each other during one of their heated arguments. Every now and then Brynn would look up hesitantly from her book, and then grip her book harder and start reading so intensely that Skye began to think that maybe she replaced the lectures with Captain America stories.

"Hey Brynn!" Hunter chirped happily as he flopped down beside Brynn, making her scream and throw her binder at him in fright.

"Woah, woah. Calm down! Yeesh, this binder is huge!"

"Shhhh!" Brynn shoved a pillow on his face.

"I'm not the one who was screaming!" Hunter protested, ripping the pillow off.

"Hush!" demanded Brynn frantically.

"Okay, okay!" whispered Hunter. "What in the world is going on?"

Brynn didn't answer, but instead pointed to the calendar on the wall. Hunter stared at it stupidly for a while.

"…Okay? There's a picture of a cat… Honestly, why did you insist on the cat calendar? We're a bunch of grown agents, and every day, we see a fluffy, fat _cat_ staring down at us! I mean, a calendar featuring all the newest machine guns would—"

He was silenced by a nudge from Brynn, and she pointed once again to the calendar.

"What?!" he sighed, exasperatedly, "Let's see. It's Friday, September 13th. It's the second Friday of September. It's September thirteenth. It's Friday the thirtee—"

"Don't say it!" yelped Brynn, shoving another cushion onto his face.

"Ridiculous!" muttered Hunter under the pillow. "Just finish your science homework and stop fretting over a silly date, or Simmons will assign you extra homework."

He promptly turned over and went to sleep. Brynn sat on his back and continued anxiously reading her science lecture.

* * *

"Alright!" said Coulson, once the team had gathered in his office, "Skye, you had some news?"

"Yes sir! We will be adding another member to this team. Lincoln has finally decided to join SHIELD!"

The whole room erupted into applause and cheers, except Brynn. She glared suspiciously at the picture of the Inhuman on the wall.

_Very suspish…Very suspicious indeed_. She thought to herself. As the rest of the team chattered away happily, she scooted out of the room and ran to her bunk.

"This is terrible!" she gasped as she slammed the door shut, "So terrible!"

* * *

"What's wrong Brynn?" asked Bobbi, "You've been really upset all day. Is something worrying you?"

"Nope!" squeaked Brynn, "Nothing at all, I'm perfectly fine! Okay? I'm fine!"

She chewed intensely on her piece of bacon and sat herself firmly in a chair. "See? Fine!"

Bobbi shrugged and decided not to meddle, so she went off to cook herself some bacon.

Skye came into the kitchen, laughing with FitzSimmons.

"I'm so excited Lincoln's coming!" she said excitedly. "He's going to be such a great addition to this team!"

Brynn scowled at the laughing trio and scampered off to her bunk. She already didn't like this Lincoln person…he puts off joining SHIELD for so long and suddenly, on _Friday the Thirteenth _he decides to join? He was definitely up to something. Most definitely. And she didn't like him. Why did Skye like him so much? He was suspicious. And Skye talked about him so much…What if Skye started hanging out with him so much, she forgot about her rookie? Brynn gasped at the thought and glared at the picture of Lincoln on her computer screen.

"There is no way you're staying here!" she growled at the scruffy inhuman, "I'll make sure you stay away."

* * *

Lincoln was welcomed to the base with open arms…at least from most of the team. Brynn just gave him a suspicious look and flounced away.

"Is that Brynn?" Lincoln asked rather sadly as he watched Brynn's blonde head running down the hall.

"Ummm…yeah," said Skye awkwardly, "She's acting a little strangely these days. Give it a little time. She'll warm up to you."

Lincoln looked a little forlorn, but brightened up at an invitation from FitzSimmons to join a video game…a decision he later regretted when they totally kicked his butt. Overall, though, he was having quite a nice time and everyone seemed to be very welcoming. Well, everyone except the kid. He hadn't seen her for the whole day.

"She's probably working on her Lego tower," Skye brushed it off, "She's obsessed with that thing."

It didn't make Lincoln feel much better, but Mack offering him bacon dumplings cheered him up.

* * *

Lincoln had been on the base for a week, and he had barely seen anything of Brynn. At dinner time, she would rush through her food and quickly leave, after washing her dish. He tried to talk to her a few times, but she would run away to Hunter or Bobbi or Coulson. At last, he gave up trying to have a conversation with her, and resorted to hanging around Skye a lot, which seemed to make that child even colder towards him. Lincoln was very, very confused.

Brynn, on the other hand, was beginning to be less suspicious, but more angry towards him. Who cared if he came on Friday the thirteenth?! He was stealing Skye from her! She furiously slammed Legos down as she teetered on top of a stack of boxes, fuming at the thought of Skye giving Lincoln training lessons right now. Sheesh! Skye even cut one of _her_ training lessons short so she could train that despicable, scruffy man.

"He's doing it on purpose!" she muttered to herself, slamming another Lego down. "He's stealing Skye from me!"

She slammed a Lego down angrily, a little too angrily, and fell off her stack of boxes.

"What in the world?!" Ward poked his head in, "Everything okay?"

"Everything is fine!" Brynn yelled, rubbing her bruised knee. "Perfectly fine, okay?!"

Ward lifted on eyebrow and came into the room.

"Really? There's so much thumping in here, I'd think that Mack was trying to do cartwheels."

"I've just been having a bad day, okay?" Brynn growled, "Can't someone just have a bad day once in a while? Is that too much to ask?!" She furiously climbed the boxes again and reached to pound yet another lego on the tower. Ward grabbed her wrist before she could.

"Come on. I'm your favorite brother. Tell me what's wrong."

"What? I just can't have a bad day? Bobbi, Skye, Simmons, and May ALL get to be moody for a week, but I can't?!"

"That's because you're too young to—never mind," said Ward hastily, "This is about Lincoln, isn't it?"

Brynn stopped short. "Whaaaat?" she asked innocently.

"Come on. Everyone's noticed that you haven't even said one word to him ever since he came to the base."

"So? Maybe I just haven't had the chance to talk to him."

"You have dinner with him every single day."

"Whatever."

"Aha!" exclaimed Ward gleefully, "This IS about Lincoln. Come, tell me what's wrong. Or I'll drag Hunter in this, and you know he always blows things out of proportion to Coulson, and he'll say you have clinical depression or something."

Brynn grumbled and hopped off her boxes and sat beside Ward on the floor.

"Fine. He keeping Skye away from me."

Ward had to cough to stop himself from laughing. "He's…what?"

"Stealing Skye from me!" she shouted petulantly, "Every time I want to talk to Skye, he goes and talks to her, and his training time is taking over some of mine!"

Ward nodded slowly. "Well, he _is_ a new agent, so his training is going to be a little heavier at first."

"So?! And he keeps sitting between Skye and Coulson at dinner, and that was _my_ spot. MINE! And he's ugly. He has a scruffy beard."

"_I_ have a scruffy beard!" said Ward indignantly.

"No, your beard is normal. His is a pathetic excuse for one. I just really don't like him."

Ward didn't really see the reasoning in that, but he decided against trying to reason with Brynn, who had climbed up the boxes to vent out her anger on yet another unfortunate Lego. Then he got an idea…

"Well, you just keep building your Lego tower. I have to go train, okay?"

"Okay. Can I come with you?" she asked, hopping off her boxes.

"Ummm, actually, I'm going to be in the shooting range, so I think it's best if you stay here."

Brynn didn't seem to pout or whine, so Ward quickly left. He ran down the hall in the opposite direction of the shooting range and into the lounge.

"I have solved it!" he shouted jubilantly.

The rest of the team looked up from their discussion.

"What? Never mind what you solved," said Simmons, "We're trying to figure out what's up with Brynn. Don't you think she's been acting very strangely?"

"That's exactly what I've solved!" crowed Ward. Scooting in between Skye and Lincoln. Skye and Lincoln both looked annoyed. Ward suspected that something was going on between them….But whatever! This was more important.

"She is jealous of Lincoln!" he announced. There was a long, awkward silence before Simmons threw a pretzel at him.

"Are you serious?! This is a serious matter! Not a joke!"

"Yeah! I think Brynn has clinical depression!" interjected Hunter.

"I'm not joking. I'm serious. She is jealous of Lincoln. And she does NOT have depression okay?"

Another pretzel hit his head. "What does Lincoln have that anyone could be jealous of?" asked Hunter.

"Hey!" Lincoln threw a pretzel at Hunter.

"It's Skye!"

There was another silence, before nine pretzels hit his head.

"Yeesh, guys, will you stop throwing pretzels at me?!"

"Why would she be jealous of Lincoln over Skye?" asked Bobbi, "It's not like Lincoln and Skye are even dating or something."

"Yeah. Who would date Lincoln?" Hunter butted in.

"Dude, seriously?!"

"You have a scruffy beard!"

"_You_ have a scruffy beard!"

"Stop it with the beards already!" yelled Ward, "Brynn is jealous of Lincoln because Lincoln spends a lot of time with Skye and she thinks he's stealing Skye from her."

Everyone raised their hands to throw pretzels at him, but stopped mid-air as they processed what he was saying.

"Ohhh…." Said Skye slowly. "That makes sense now."

Lincoln looked highly uncomfortable, but rather relieved at the same time.

"Oh, and she thinks Lincoln's scruffy beard makes him ugly," added in Ward.

"What the hell?" spluttered Lincoln, "Why does everyone hate my beard?"

"Don't ask me, it's 'Brynn reasoning.'"

"Well, I don't hate your beard," said Skye sweetly.

Ward looked at the two of them suspiciously. Yup. Something was _definitely_ going on.

"What do I do? I wasn't trying to make her feel left out or something… Should I go talk to her?"

"NO!" shouted everyone at once.

"She would either completely ignore your presence, or she would pelt you with Legos." Explained Simmons.

"You need to entice her with something she loves…" said Ward, "Like…Pranks…ICERS…Candy…Thor…"

"That's it!" yelled Skye.

"Thor? Sorry, but I don't think ugly men with scruffy beards are allowed in Asgard."

"Will you stop?" whined Lincoln.

"Just joking, mate!" laughed Hunter.

"No, not Thor. Pranks. Ask her if she'll help you prank someone, and somehow get candy involved, and bribe her with something sparkly. There's no way she could resist." Ward looked very proud of himself.

Lincoln looked pretty impressed. "So, should I go right now?"

"No. She'll suspect something, since I just talked to her. Do it tomorrow."

"Well then…I think I need to go shopping for sparkly stuff now," sighed Lincoln, "Skye, what's that really annoying store that sells sparkly stuff for little girls?"

"Claire's. I'll go with you!"

The two of them skipped out of the room. Ward was positive that there was something going on between them.

* * *

Lincoln took a deep breath as he listened to Brynn slamming Legos down inside the room.

_Here goes_, he thought, and pushed the door open.

"Holy cow that is a massive Lego tower!" he yelped, taking in the colorful blocks taking up nearly a third of the room.

On the other side, hidden by the tower, Brynn smirked to herself proudly.

"Well, Brynn, I was wondering—" Lincoln flinched as Brynn's hand shot up and slammed a Lego on the top of the tower. "I was wondering if you could help me."

Behind the tower, Brynn was appalled. How dare the scruffy man ask for her service?! She slammed another Lego down.

Lincoln meanwhile was wondering how none of the Legos were broken. "Well, I need help with a prank, and I heard you're really good with them."

Brynn paused her Lego abuse. "Keep talking." She said slowly.

"Well…I was hoping to prank everyone on the base. You know? Besides Coulson and May of course. That wouldn't be a good idea. I wanted to prank Fitz first. We can steal his candy collection."

The top of Brynn's head poked out from the top of the tower.

"If you help me, you get to have these." He held up a pair of sparkly shoes.

Brynn's head popped out from the side of the Lego tower, eye's wide open and gleaming with excitement. Lincoln could swear she turned into the heart-eyes emoji.

"Well….?"

"I'll help you!" she said hastily, jumping down from her boxes and running over to him. "Come to my bunk! I already have an idea!"

She grabbed his arm and dragged him down the hall.

_Well that went well,_ thought Lincoln happily.

_He's not as ugly as I thought,_ thought Brynn.

* * *

The pranks, Lincoln concluded, were brilliant. They had not only gotten half of Fitz's candy and shaved Hunter's beard in a hideous pattern, but they had also heard Mack scream and dyed Ward's underwear pink.

But better than all of that, Brynn had officially given him the title of "Funnest Brother" (something which made Hunter very, very jealous).

At the moment, he was lying on the couch with Brynn sitting on his stomach (something he noticed she really liked to do), and listening to her rattle on and on about something to do with Thor and Loki and Muscles.

"And that is why Thor is better than Loki," Brynn finished, "See? Thor is the best."

"Very good reasoning," applauded Lincoln, "Now tell me about that time Hunter tried to get you drunk."

Ward stood by the doorway, proudly observing his handiwork.

"Wow, robot. You did something _nice!_" said Skye, punching his arm.

"Hey!"

"They're so cute," sighed Skye, leaning against the door.

Ward waggled his eyebrows. "_They_? As in, Lincoln too?"

"Huh?"

"Awwwwww!" gushed Ward dramatically, "I think you _like_ like someone! You like Lincoln!"

"Whaaaaat?" Skye asked innocently ,"Wha?—psshhh—no—haha—whatwouldmakeyouthinkthat? Psshhhh…noooo…hehehe…gotta go!"

Skye dashed away, leaving Ward laughing behind her. Ward just found himself a new mission.


	14. The (sort of) Calm Before the Storm

**So…Umm…yeah. I guess you could say it's been a while. :P But in my defense, I had a lot of school and APs and exams…so yeah. Here's the next chapter that took over half a year to write. Oh, and I'm disregarding the fact that AoS killed off THE TWO MOST HANDSOMEST PEOPLE ON THE SHOW, so Ward (WHO IS NOT HIVE) and Lincoln will remain in my story. *sobs and weeps over Lincoln* *whyyyyy* I may or may not include Elena and Joey. I probably will. Anyways, I should be updating more often now. Hopefully. Oh and Daisy will still be referred to as Skye. OMG SO MANY THINGS HAVE CHANGED. Oh, and Hunter and Bobbi are still here. **

"It's been too long!" Hissed Brynn, "TOO LONG!"

"Geez, calm down!" Yelped Lincoln as the fiery blonde charged into his bunk. "Too long since what?"

"The Pranks!"

Lincoln rolled his eyes. "Seriously? We pranked the entire team just last week. You seriously want to prank them again?"

"Not those pranks, silly, the Pranks of War!"

Lincoln had heard all about the prank war that had erupted between certain members of the team and how Brynn had pranked Coulson, and then Coulson double pranked Brynn, so Brynn double pranked Coulson with the help of Ward, and then Coulson pranked Brynn but Brynn and Ward pranked Coulson at the same time, and somehow May got involved, so now everyone was fearing for their lives.

"War? I think that's a little bit of an overstatement—"

"NAY! It is not!" shouted Brynn vehemently.

"Nay? Brynn, have you been reading Thor fanfiction again?"

"No…"

"Really?"

"…"

"…"

"Fine! I was. But that's not the point! I need to get back at Coulson. And I need help." Brynn batted her eyelashes.

"No, no, no, no, no, no! I will not help you with your shenanigans against the director!"

Brynn huffed and crossed her arms. "Pleeeeaaasssee? This will erupt into World War 3, and if you don't take a side, you might die!"

"If I take a side, I risk the anger of my boss!"

"You need to straighten out your priorities! Fine. I'm going to go ask Mack for help."

She turned on her heel and marched out of Lincoln's bunk, leaving him shaking his head. How did they manage to keep up with her all the time?

* * *

"But Mackie! I need help!" pleaded Brynn, "If I don't Coulson will win the war!"

"No."

"But Maaaacckk!"

"No."

"Please? Pretty please?"

"No."

Mack was focused intently on the videogame he was playing, determined to finish off Skye once and for all. He barely noticed the tiny girl poking her head under his arm.

"Please Mackie?"

"YES!" cheered Mack, although for other reasons than what Brynn had in mind. He watched jubilantly as Skye's player went crashing down a cliff before erupting into flames.

"So you'll help?" squealed Brynn.

"What? No."

"But you just—"

"No."

Brynn put on her best "dejected puppy" face and slunk off, probably to pester Hunter, Mack suspected.

* * *

"Please, May?" whined Coulson.

"Please _what?"_ snapped May, irritated by Coulson's begging.

"Help me get revenge on Ward and Brynn!"

"No."

"But I know you're planning a revenge on Ward!"

"Yes, I am. But it's none of your business."

"But we can team up together and take him down once and for all. I need your help, May. I don't have any ideas, and if you don't help me, I'll be left for Ward to prey on!"

May cocked an eyebrow. "Dramatic much?"

Coulson sighed. "Okay, fine. How about this? You get to think of the revenge plan, and I'll gather the materials and resources needed to carry it out. See? You get to boss me around."

"But I boss you around anyways." May secretly enjoyed making Coulson suffer and beg at her feet. It was payback for when he blamed her for the flour prank.

"But May, I'm helpless here! You don't want to see your best friend being torn apart by those two wolves, do you?" whined Coulson, switching tactics once again.

"Fine, fine!" relented May, deciding she had had enough of Coulson's pathetic mewls. "But I'm only helping you get revenge on Ward. Not Brynn."

"Deal!" shouted Coulson exultantly, shaking May's outstretched hand. Ward was going down!

* * *

Ward was hunched over a computer in his bunk. Ward did not need help. Ward did not need allies. Ward was mighty! He cackled evilly has he drew up his master plan. He needed to get revenge on Brynn for framing him, but at the same time cause enough commotion for Coulson so that the director would be too distracted to prank him back. And then he needed to trap May somewhere until he turned her anger to another unsuspecting member of the team. And then he needed to (very secretively) get back at Skye for ratting him out to Coulson.

"Ward, why are you laughing so weird?" asked a voice behind him.

"Skye!" he yelped, slamming the computer shut so that his genius plot would not be revealed, especially to that little daddy's girl (Ward may or may not have been a little jealous over how much Coulson favored Skye over him). "I was just…reading something funny," he lied smoothly, "Do you know why the Iphone 6s is so great? Because it's a success! Get it? Six-S? Success? Get it? Get it? Hahahaha!" he snorted with laughter (and pride) and the genius of his pun.

Skye rolled her eyes at his antics and walked away. Unbeknownst to the bearded man laughing in front of his computer, (he really needed to shave) Skye knew what he was up to. Did he really think she was thick enough not to see through that pathetic pun? What did he take her for? A fool?

But she was most upset that he was plotting against her. They were best friends! She was supposed to be his ally.

"Fine!" she muttered to herself, "If he's going to play dirty, so will I!"

She made her way to Brynn's bunk and flung open the door, a plan already brewing in her mind.

"Brynn!" She hollered. There was no reply. "Brynn!" she yelled again. Silence. Skye was puzzled. She was _sure_ she had seen Brynn come in here…. "YOUNG ONE?" she tested. Brynn had recently gone on a Thor craze. They had visited the Avengers Tower (wow Cap's face when he saw Coulson was PRICELESS and Tony was like OMG WTF WTH AHHHH and wow Skye was still laughing at all their reactions it was seriously the best hahahahaha), the sound of the door opening jolted Skye out of her hilariously happy memories.

"Skye?"

"Brynn? Lincoln?"

Lincoln stopped short and jumped behind Brynn, and looked ridiculous in doing so because she legit hid none of him. Skye gaped.

"WHAT THE HELL CAMPBELL!"

Lincoln cowered under her glare. "I'm sorry, I just wanted Hunter to get off my back about it, okay? If you're really mad, it'll grow back!"

"BUT I LIKED YOUR SCRUFF!" yelled Skye, "NOW YOU LOOK LIKE A SHAVED MOUSE!"

Indeed, Lincoln's chin was shining free-of-scruff for the first time in years and Brynn was happily holding a razor.

"BRYNN!" yelled Skye, "WHY?!"

Brynn pouted. "But Hunter was being meaaaaan to Lincoln about it, so I thought I would help him out."

Skye flopped on the bed. "Don't cave in to peer pressure! Gosh, you guys are seriously weak."

Lincoln sat down meekly beside her. "I'm sorry. I'm just really tired of Hunter's jokes."

Skye huffed. "Apology accepted. But why couldn't you have just made fun of Hunter's scruff back at him? Gosh, he looks better without it anyways."

Lincoln shrugged. "I dunno. I didn't want to be mean." He awkwardly patted Skye's head.

Skye sat up. "You need to learn to be mean, then. Take a lesson from me. If Hunter says you look ugly with a beard, tell him he looks like a rat, okay? A damn rat."

Lincoln chuckled. "Okay."

Brynn stood by the door raising an eyebrow at both of them. Such lovebirds. Much sweet.

"Oh, and by the way, Ward is planning something big against literally all of us. Like every last one," said Skye jumping up. "And we need to stop him before he explodes the base. Who's in?"

Up in the air vents May gasped. This was getting crazy.


End file.
